Eternal Lids Apart
by Maggie Wilde
Summary: Post ME-2. AU-Canon. Commander Shepard discovers the fate of the universe is changed forever by time. She motivates her crew to fight an ultimate enemy no one is prepared for. This enemy, consumed by hatred, will do whatever it takes to destroy her. Even if it means using those she loves. But Shepard is a survivor.
1. Collectors Destroyed

**Author's Note: **

**This is my first time attempting a Mass Effect Fanfiction and I'm pretty excited about it. Enjoy! (I could write more in the summary, but I think I'd be giving the story away) ;D **

**Trivia: The title of the fic is a line from poem 'Bright Star' by John Keats. **

**A Small Disclaimer: Everything Mass Effect related belongs to Bioware. The plot details and any original characters belong to me (at least). I'm just writing for fun and need to cure my obsession with the franchise.**

* * *

_Just another routine mission_.

It was a couple of hours later when Commander Shepard slumped on the bed in her quarters. They'd destroyed the collector ship and the human reaper. She had lost a couple of squad mates. Silence now ensued. There was a general humming in the background, the slow beat of her heart, and not even a vibration from the ship could be heard. She hadn't paid much attention to her quarters when she first arrived. She'd only seen the plush white sheets of the bed and dived into them. Her eyes now idly drifted around the cabin, at the expense of it all.

Even now, after several months, she was still unable to realise it had been two years since she'd been conscious. She shuddered to think of how much they had paid out for her. She was a living proof of the money they'd spent, bringing her back from the dead. The so-called Lazarus Project. Four billion credits, she once heard on a data log. The light of the room caught on the edges of the furniture, catching her eye. Everything was shiny, brand new, and significantly better than the last. The only personal effects were her old, battered N7 helmet. No photographs, models or decorations. On a whim she bought a hamster, which drew a funny look from Miranda. She was given standard navy issue toiletries before, but Cerberus really had gone all out. Her mind soon drifted back to the mission.

She'd never experienced such privileges. She didn't like it. The reputation from her actions during the Skyllian Blitz had always made her feel curiously awkward. A hero, a revered _celebrity_, drawing out admirers and creeps alike. Unease filled the pit of her stomach through the entire mission with Cerberus. They had rebuilt her. Was she grateful? She wasn't really sure. She'd never thanked Miranda. Shepard might be the Commander on the _SR-2_, but ultimately she had the Illusive Man to answer to. She despised him perhaps more than she had despised Saren. At least Saren had the excuse of being indoctrinated. _It could be worse_, she told herself. _Miranda could've implanted a control chip in your brain_.

She got up and walked towards the bathroom, longing for a aware she needed to see Chakwas, and then speak to Admiral Hackett. She was trying not to think about that. Her body, leaner and more agile than it had been before, now felt sore and weary. She slowly walked to the bathroom. She was somewhat afraid to look at herself in the mirror as she walked towards the basin. She hadn't done so since she'd woken up – at least five months ago. Her stomach clenched in fear. Perhaps they'd covered up that scar she had since she was sixteen on her right cheek? What about that wonky tooth she'd had since a teenager? That had been bugging her for a while. Or those horrid moles all over her shoulders and neck? Why hadn't they done anything about _that_? She smiled to herself, amused. Suddenly there was a tap at the door.

_What's wrong with you assholes, it's 1.30am, _she heard herself muttering as she walked towards a hidden panel to unlock the door. The doors opened to reveal Garrus, his mandibles tensed in what looked like nervousness. Her irritated look was immediately softened.

"I haven't interrupted at a bad time have I?" he said. She gave him a suggestive smirk (hopefully he interpreted it as good) and turned away back to the bathroom.

"I was just about to strip off and have a shower," she called back to him from the bathroom. "Pretty rude I think." She whipped off her Cerberus over-shirt, dumping it on the floor.

"You always have a shower at 1.30 in the morning?" he said, having forgotten his nerves, leaning against the doorway. She peeled off a white long-sleeved t-shirt, leaving her in just a sleeveless vest.

"You always call at unsociable hours, Vakarian? That's not very 'by-the-book'. Did your father teach you nothing?" she teased him, now unlacing her boots. She noticed him studying her rather astutely.

"I don't remember you having so many layers, Shepard," said Garrus, coming closer, his eyes firm on her. She raised an eyebrow.

"Ah, is that why you have come so well prepared?" she teased, having to crane her head to look up at him. "I see no armour..." He was in his undersuit. If it was possible, she thought he looked more serious. His mandibles were no longer pulled into what resembled a grin.

"I was actually wanting to see if you were alright..." he began. "You didn't see Chakwas. She was getting restless an hour ago..."

Shepard rolled her eyes. She turned round to the basin, running water to splash over her face. She could do flirty, but the squishy emotional stuff? Somehow it made her body ache, her hands clammy, her cheeks hot. As she continued to wash her face, she felt his rough talons suddenly clutch her upper arms, pulling her upwards. Goosebumps erupted along her skin, as she suddenly felt him directly press behind her, nuzzling his face into the crook between her neck and shoulder. She still hadn't given into the temptation of kissing him yet. Her hands gripped the basin as he continued, smirking to himself.

"Hm...definitely too many layers," he whispered into her ear, pinging the strap on her vest. _Well_ this was a different tactic for him, she thought. Beforehand, she'd been doing a lot of the wooing, considering she'd been the first to actually suggest sex. He moved his talons carefully up and down her arms, before setting them down on her hips. In all of a sudden, she felt her cheeks begin to feel hot. _Christ. Am I really blushing? _She brought her head up to suddenly find her reflection in the mirror. Her eyes now took on a brown-red hue. Her old scar on her right cheek had disappeared, in place, she'd been granted an entirely new one. It was more like a crack, where an orangey hue of light sat beneath it. She pressed her fingers against it, tentatively. Still unhealed. Chakwas had warned her about it, that she had to be _compassionate_. She now ignored the fact that her cheeks had become a rosy pink. She met Garrus's steady blue eyes in the mirror.

"I haven't looked in the mirror since..." She trailed off. She pressed her fingers into her scar again. Garrus took her hand tightly, clutching it in his own, his skin cold and rough against hers.

"We're a good match, Shepard," he said, his breath hot on her face. What was he _doing_ to her? She made a bigger impression that she realised.

"You're getting to be a bit cocky, turian," she said, reaching up to carefully touch his head plates, along the ridge of his scar.

"You gonna have that shower or what..." he growled, a single digit fingering the waistband of her cargo pants.

They were interrupted by a sudden reverberation, breaking them apart. It ran throughout the ship, rattling the metal hull violently. The sound of debris and small particles of broken-up asteroid bounced loudly along the shielded hull of the ship. Everything creaked in a way it shouldn't have done. Shepard broke from EDI spoke over them. Commander to the bridge. Joker's voice broke through the intercom. His voice held the same note of desperation when the _Normandy_ _SR-1_ was under attack.

"Commander…You're gonna have to see this. We're in trouble."

Shepard threw her Cerberus over-shirt back on, giving Garrus a long glance. Why could possibly be wrong now? The suicide mission had been completed.

Just another day, another _routine mission._


	2. Shepard Stranded

The _Normandy_ SR-2 juddered the entire time as she made it up to the cockpit, avoiding the lift. The effort taken to climb the ship's stairs while it juddered reminded her of past zero-gravity training. Once she was up on the CIC deck, she saw her crew in their seats, stationed at the terminals, their bodies poised. She began to feel the same sort of fear she had felt two years ago, when her previous ship had been under attack. Shepard was nearly flung to the floor when she felt something smash the side of the ship with unprecedented force. Crewmembers chattered around her, running ship diagnostics.

"Status report, Joker!" she barked at her helmsman, barely making it to the cockpit before she was nearly thrown from her feet again. It was a time like this she wished there was an extra seat next to Joker's. Asking for status reports every time there was a situation in the past, always had her clinging to the back of Joker's seat. On occasion, she'd been thrown to the floor. She didn't really need to ask for a ship report, however. The shutters were open and all she could see surrounding them were large quantities of debris.

"I don't remember passing this particular debris field, do you Commander? Seems like a pretty big thing to miss!" shouted Joker, as a spray of debris hit them head on: tiny little particles, millions of them. Shepard's eyes soon were soon trained on something in the far distance. Her chest tightened considerably as she clutched the back of Joker's leather seat.

"Shield status Edi," she said.

"Forty percent," the AI replied. They'd taken damage earlier before entering the Collector ship, but the engineers were able to restore the advanced kinetic barriers they had installed to at least seventy percent in the last two hours. Shepard kept her eyes ahead, watching the debris tear around them through the vacuum. It didn't appear to be the remains of a ship: she had seen plenty of those in her short lifetime to realise it wasn't anything like debris from a spacecraft.

"We passed the Tartarus field on the way, surely this is what we're still passing through," she said in disbelief.

"Commander, my records indicate there has been a recent explosion, local time it happened approximately five hours and forty two minutes ago," said Edi. Joker's responsive hands swept over his terminal quickly. Shepard couldn't see his face due to his cap, but his shoulders were hunched forward in strain. She frowned, looking into the distance, as Joker's single left hand pointed.

"You don't remember that massive curved metal arm tearing through space do you, Commander?" said Joker. At this point usually she would've scolded him for his facetiousness, but she remained for silent for now, her eyes hard on the horizon.

"Commander Shepard, I have just analysed the coordinates. The explosion occurred where the Omega 4 Relay was stationed," said Edi. Shepard didn't have a second to react before throwing herself into the seat a metre away from Joker. The ship outmanoeuvred one of the enormous gyroscopic rings that belonged to the previous Omega 4 Relay. The relay's remains span through space, unable to slow its spiralling momentum due to zero gravity. The bright centre core of the galaxy's black hole caught on the shiny metal of the ruins of the relay, glittering before Shepard's eyes.

"Better stay in the seat behind me, Commander!" Joker barely had time to say before the ship swerved nauseatingly upwards to avoid another piece of the relay that hurtled towards them. Despite the explosion occurring hours ago, the remains were unable to stop careering listlessly through the vacuum of space. The astonishment of what had happened suddenly struck Shepard; for a momentary instant she was not able to think rationally.

"Tell the Alliance I'll be late getting back to Earth," was all she could say to Joker, as they manoeuvred through the remains of the Relay. It was her turn to be facetious.

* * *

It was several days later. They had begun to chart a course to the nearest system, but even with their advanced FTL Drive Core it would take them a minimum of two years. This area of space was unchartered, empty for an interminable distance, with no stations or fuel depots. The nearest cluster was Hawking Eta, which only had one relay in the Chandrasekhar system, along with a fuel depot. Two years was a damn long time according to Shepard, and it was time they did not have. They had contacted the Alliance, letting them know of the situation, but at the moment, they had to stay put. It reminded each and every member on board how vulnerable they all were, despite the advanced equipment of FTL drives, stealth technology, heavy armour and state of the art design. It was easy to become used to the mass relays. They had calculated their fuel would last them two weeks, and minerals only a month. A lot of the minerals had already been used for research.

It wasn't enough for a potential two-year mission. Even though the Alliance suggested such an idea, no systems were close enough to where they were situated in the galactic core, which was northwest, in order to pick them up. They were well and truly stranded. The Alliance couldn't yet strip Shepard of her rank yet. She knew she was going to be detained: either because of Cerberus or the destruction of a system in Batarian space trying to avoid an imminent Reaper invasion. She knew she had one job; stop the Reapers. The cross-examining by previous colleagues and friends no matter how hurtful didn't stop her doing what she had to; how many times did she tell people that she was in charge, that she did _not work_ for Cerberus? A lot of things didn't work in her favour. Nosey news reporters didn't help, for one, although she had made it worse on one case. She was sat on her bed at this point, like it was back to square one. Shepard glanced at her digital clock on her bedside table. They followed time as it was on Earth. At the moment it was three in the morning. She hadn't slept properly for days, and it wasn't likely she'd be sleeping tonight either. She sifted a hand through her hair, which felt like straw.  
She sat on the edge of the bed, staring at the clock for a long time. She had spent most of her time in the briefing and communications room, speaking to Edi, Joker, Jacob and the two engineers. The rest of the crew she hadn't spoken to. Who would destroy a Mass Relay? What would? It simply wasn't possible. There was no other explanation. Relays were protected enough with high-defence quantum shields, invulnerable to damage. It would take an extremely powerful weapon to destroy a Mass Relay, especially one that could tear it apart as it had done with the Omega 4. It wasn't until six in the morning that Edi softly spoke to her from above in her room. Shepard was already up and dressed, unable to look at her rather exhausted face bearing those repulsive scars.

"Commander Shepard, I have the coordinates plotted on the galaxy map in the CIC," began Edi. Shepard stopped before she entered the elevator leading upwards.

"You found something?" Shepard asked, although nothing in her heart of hearts could say it would be positive. With no relay, they lost time. And this was unchartered space.

"An unchartered dwarf planet. It would take approximately twenty four hours to reach, however our fuel will have exceeded its limit by that time," answered Edi. Shepard thought for a moment, but it did not bear much contemplation. She couldn't see any other way. Here she was, the so-called hero, stuck in the middle of nowhere. She wasn't the warrior they were looking for. Not at first. She'd never expected to be a leader, but somehow circumstances had placed her in a leader's position. She just needed the job done.

"Have you been able to take any readings?" was all Shepard said.

"I will be able to take a better reading once we reach the vicinity of the planet, so far I have only detected no life forms, trace atmosphere and a reading of 0.6152 surface gravity. Surface temperature is -67 degrees Celsius," the AI said. Shepard stood there for a moment, thinking. It sounded a lot like Earth's Luna: no life forms, freezing cold and no atmosphere. Ideally, it was a good place to land. A place where no hostile life forms native to a planet could potentially attack them. And no atmosphere was better than a toxic atmosphere. It was almost embarrassing. The last thing she wanted was to land on an unchartered dwarf planet.

"Thanks Edi, I'm on my way up," said Shepard. Her mind was running a mile. She couldn't keep up with all the thoughts bouncing around in her head. She wasn't looking forward to speaking with the other crewmembers either. Shepard didn't feel surprised when she exited the elevator to find most of her crew standing round the large galaxy map, staring at her. Some with unease, some with curiosity, some with blatant irritation. Her closest friends looked at her with concern.

"With all due respect, Commander," began a man named Kingsley, who worked on the CIC deck. "But we have been kept in the dark long enough. We know of the situation, isn't it time that you told us-"

"The situation may be critical Kingsley, but that is no way to speak to the Commander," countered Jacob on the other side of the group. Shepard hadn't even taken a look at the coordinates and readings of the dwarf planet on the map yet.

"How long are we gonna be floating in unchartered space before the fuel runs out? Or before random mercenary groups raid this ship for-" Suddenly everyone began talking, countering each other, raising their voices, filling the large expanse of the deck. They were truly frightened. There were stories of ships lost in space, the ones you never really believed. Humanity had powered through expansion of space exploration thanks to the relays. No one fully understood mass relays, but they were convenient and worked.

"That's enough!" shouted Shepard over the noise. Everyone immediately quietened, this time with nothing more to say. She climbed the steps that overlooked the large digital galaxy map, sweeping her hands over it to bring up the image and readings of the dwarf planet. Her eyes roved over the readings quickly, taking in the information.

"You may not like it, but we are _stranded_. We have only enough fuel to get us to land on this dwarf planet, but to reach the next cluster, Hawking Eta, Edi predicts would take a minimum of two years. We don't have enough minerals for that," she barked, but her hands were shaking. She clutched the railing to disguise this.

"This planet offers us nothing in terms of fuel or minerals. The Alliance is due to speak to me on the comm link in an hour's time. The Alliance has some of the best ships in the galaxy, some with a bigger FTL drive core than the _SR-2's_. For now, we land on this dwarf planet. The best the Alliance can do to help us is reach the nearest Mass Relay in the Hawking Eta cluster and travel from there to us. It's not much. But it's the best we have." Shepard felt like an idiot, standing there, trying to assure everyone, telling her crew that they were stranded. _You're meant to be some kind of hero_, a little voice said at the back of her mind. _You're a Spectre. You're N7, for God's sake_. She dismissed the crew, swallowing what felt like a hard ball of wool. She could hear Jack's voice in the background.

"Oh big fucking plan! Wait for the mothership to arrive!"She wasn't sure where to turn to, feeling awkward, as the crewmembers went back to their stations. What for, her mind countered. They were a floating hunk of metal in the vast vacuum of nowhere. She decided to wait in the briefing room behind the elevator. Perhaps sit there for an hour, trying to think of how to be a hero. She passed Samara as she determinedly made her way to the comm room, pointedly ignoring Garrus who watched her a little too closely. She wished he'd stop staring. If Liara were here, she would be banging on her cabin door asking her what the hell was the matter. In a polite manner of course. The other crewmembers she had formed a close bond with, were not the kind of people who would invasively ask her what was the matter.

"I do wonder where your loyalties lie, Commander," Samara said, her large blue eyes seemingly undressing Shepard as they always had done. Shepard wasn't sure what point Samara was trying to make, surprised the Asari had questioned her like that. A chill cascaded down her spine as she headed to the comm room. She heard nothing in the room but the ringing of her ears, thankfully devoid of crew.

"Would you like me to connect you through to the Alliance, Commander?" asked Edi, as soon as Shepard walked through the room.

"Patch him through," said Shepard, stepping forward, straightening up. The Quantum Entanglement Communicator within the room encased her in a glowing field of amber. Admiral Hackett's weather-beaten face flickered up first before the rest of his body in front of her, sat in an Alliance war room. Nice to see a change, instead of the Illusive Man's vast arena of cigarette smoke in front of him, and a dying star behind him. Admiral Hackett's perceptive eyes pierced through her. Shepard breathed in a slow breath through her nose, looking straight back at him.

* * *

It was a harmless, barren planet, to which their sensors detected nothing, but Shepard's instinct told her otherwise. Joker somewhat cheekily told the Commander she was as stubborn as a mule, but she straight-facedly told him they were taking a shuttle down first. The _Normandy_ had just enough minerals to stay in orbit over the planet, but only for another forty hours. She was determined to find something on this dwarf planet, even if it was a bunch of Geth waiting to ambush them. Shepard suspected the _Normandy_'s sensors were jammed, despite the fact Edi would've picked something like this up instantly. It didn't sit right with her. Whatever the situation, they had to search the planet for minerals, manually without Edi's sensors on the _Normandy._  
Cerberus operative Jacob, Justicar Samara and bounter hunter Zaeed were the willing crew ready to go out with her. She suited up in her cabin before heading up to the armoury for her weapons. Her dark red-black armour glinted in the strange bluish light of her cabin. They soon boarded the drop shuttle _UT-47 Kodiak_, with one of the pilots. Shepard uncharacteristically sat there with her pistol in her hand, watching the transmissions readings on the screen above her in the silence. Her feet tapped restlessly. Samara appeared calm and serene, gazing into vacant space. Jacob appeared desperate to talk, while Zaeed did nothing but slowly tap the side of his weapon against his thigh. It took them twenty minutes to reach the barren rocky surface of this dwarf planet.

"Coming up thirty metres, Commander," announced the pilot. The crew readied themselves. Shepard switched on her magnetic boots, put her helmet on, and waited by the shuttle's door. A safe landing indeed.

"Be prepared," Shepard told them sharply, as the computerised voice above announced it was equalising pressure with the exterior atmosphere. The shuttle's door opened upwards, expelling steam.

"Always prepared, Ma'am," Zaeed replied, readying his gun. Shepard nearly smiled. _It was an unchartered world_, Shepard had to remind herself. Anything could be here, contrary to the fact their sensors picked up nothing. They stepped out of the shuttle, treading the rocky, uneven ground. Shepard lead the way, ready to fall behind them to cover with her sniper rifle if needs be. The landscape was vast and inhospitable. Miles of broken boulders and large craters lay ahead of them. The galaxy's core provided the planet only way Shepard could hear anything was through her careful footsteps crunching the ground, the sound travelling through her suit. It was quiet for several moments, perhaps ten minutes. They were about seven metres away from the shuttle now.  
It then happened all too quickly. Their drop shuttle suddenly exploded, propelling the squad members four feet into the air away from the area of impact. Shepard felt her body being thrown across the thin atmosphere like a rag doll. She'd lost her heavy pistol she'd been holding as she landed at least fifteen metres away from the explosion.

Landing heavily on her side, she took several seconds to check herself. Nothing broken. Air supply intact. She still had her submachine gun and sniper rifle. Her head whirled and her ears sang. Her arms and back were smarting from the explosion but she pushed herself up from the ground, her submachine gun in her hand. She couldn't hear anything, not even her breathing. Some of the wreckage of the shuttle, which had been completely annihilated, was still rolling away in the distance. Nothing was on fire, due to the lack of oxygen, but the pieces of what was once the _UT-47 Kodiak_ was burnt black. Shepard ignored her badly burnt arms and back, looking for signs of her squad. They would've been thrown just as far, but she couldn't see their bodies, although she spotted Zaeed's assault rifle a few metres ahead. She felt blood pumping in her ears. She checked the horizon for possible signs of the perpetrator. A thin white trail was in the sky, gently fading. A missile: a large one at that, especially as it left a trail. But she couldn't see where it had come from. There was no evidence. The night sky burned bright with stars. She saw the _Normandy SR-2_ in the far distance above her.

"Joker, come in Joker," she spoke to her earpiece, but her voice was muffled. Nothing was heard on the other end of the line. She tried again, but all she could hear was the ringing in her ears.

"_Normandy SR-2_!" she barked, trying to hear herself, looking up at her ship in the distance. Frowning, she had seen it changed it's position, although only slightly. It was further to her right, and higher in the air.

"Commander Shepard reporting, the drop shuttle has been hit by a missile-"

She was abruptly cut off, as the earpiece crackled in her ear. Right before her eyes, the _Normandy SR-2 _detonated quietly. The middle of the ship tore apart, flinging wreckage in every possible direction. The debris span and cascaded into nothing. Whatever was left of the engines quietly imploded, casting a brilliant white light onto her face. The sphere of pure white light sat in its entirety for a moment, outlined in blue, before slowly retracting. The light was so intense Shepard had to shield her eyes for a moment. The white sphere withdrew into a bluish cloud, the remains of a second explosion, where the drive core had imploded.

She then watched whatever was left of her ship, and her crew, gently float away from the dwarf planet. Shepard wasn't sure how long she had been stood there, her entire body pulsating, but it had been twenty minutes. Some of the _Normandy's_ remains were pulled into the planet's little gravity, but most of it had been shot away, flung deep into space or hung there uselessly. When she was able to take her eyes away from the scene of devastation above her, she scanned the vicinity for Zaeed, Jacob or Samara. But there was no sign of them. They were all gone. Thousands of questions flittered through her mind. _The Collectors? A Reaper? What?_ She began to run back to where the _Kodiak_ had landed, desperately hoping. Despite her magnetic boots, it was still remarkably difficult to run as she would with better gravity. Her arms couldn't propel her forward enough, and the magnetic in her boots slammed her down every time she lifted her foot, so her running was stunted. If someone had been watching from afar, it would've looked rather amusing. She couldn't have been the only one to survive. She _couldn't._

She saw the charred, blackened remains of her shuttle, but all around her could she see no sign of her two crewmates. The utter disbelief of what happened hadn't hit her yet, but she was ultimately a soldier, and her mind was still engrossed on anything but the shock. There was a crackling in her ear, from the in-built receiver she used to contact the _Normandy_. Nothing on the other end of the line. She looked back up. There was nothing left in the sky now, although she could see traces of the _Normandy_, still floating in the infinite empty vacuum. A little electronic voice on her omni-tool announced something she at first didn't hear. It was an incredible feat she was still alive, but it was hardly surprising – a lot of her history relied on pure luck. The dwarf planet was alit by the visible black hole west of her view, the light being sucked into a large black sphere, bigger than anything she had seen. The huge accretion disk belonging to the black hole provided a little light to the dwarf planet she was currently standing on, but not much heat.

Shepard began to walk, although she wasn't sure where. Her calves burned, strained from the low gravity and the heaviness of her magnetic boots. Fifteen minutes had passed by the time she arrived at a huge crater. Sweat ran down her back and face. The inside of her helmet misted up as she panted. The stars ahead of her in the sky glinted. Behind them sat a vast nebula, bright purple and cobalt swathes of gas. Her eyes drooped a little, while watching the beautiful scene ahead of her. _What am I doing? _She had to keep walking, but deep down she knew it was futile. She was totally and utterly stranded. No outside communication, with her shuttle and ship destroyed. All her crew gone. _Gone. _A lump formed at the back of her throat when she thought…

Shepard forced herself back up before she could think any more, and continued to walk around the crater. It was a miracle her oxygen supply was not compromised, as it had been when the Collectors had destroyed the _Normandy SR-1_. She brought up her omni-tool checking the oxygen supply. Twenty-five percent left, which was a total of forty-five minutes. The silence hummed. It seemed like forty-five minutes to certain death. She spotted a small crack in her helmet. Give it ten minutes, she thought to herself. Bringing up her omni tool once more, she saw she had waked three miles. And all the while, as she began to stumble across the uneven texture of the surface, she couldn't possibly come to a conclusion of who would be behind the _Normandy's_ destruction. Everyone whom she had come to trust had been wiped out within minutes. Her breath was becoming shallower and she turned away from the light of the black hole, which glinted off her armour.

Tears were running down her face, she wasn't sure what the cause of them was. By the time she reached another crater, Shepard finally let herself collapse to the uncomfortable ground, dropping her weapon. Her eyes closed briefly. As she lay there on her back, she checked her omni tool again. The oxygen supply told her dismally it was now five percent. _Commander Shepard. Distinguished Alliance Navy and N7 operative. War hero. A celebrity in the media to some people._ She loathed some of those titles. And she wasn't going to like this death very much either. Despite her awkwardness about her own achievements and recognition, she at least wanted to die with dignity. She lifted herself upwards with a lot of difficulty, unable to bear lying on the uncomfortable ground any longer. Her eyes roved over the inside of the crater.

Something unexpected caught her eye. It was a small grey building and rectangular in size. It had the distinct air of abandonment about it, most of it cast in shadow from the large walls of the crater. A small vehicle, which looked suspiciously like the old _M-29 IFV Grizzly_, and a construction drill, its auger buried deep, sat outside. She had only ten minutes left. Picking up her Widow and slinging it on her back, she threw herself down the side of the huge crater.

Shepard yelped and cursed as she picked up momentum, unable to stop herself from falling. Her armour smashed hard against the rocks. Eventually she landed at the bottom of the crater, with a significant number of cracks now in her helmet screen. Her arms had bared the brunt of it, and were bleeding profusely. She ignored it, and breathing hard, ran towards the building. She had Liara's voice in her head. _Thank the Goddess. _


	3. The Lone Base

Commander Shepard barely had enough time. The door was bypassed easily with her omni-tool. Not only was she a soldier, she was a tech specialist. She was extremely proficient in hacking and reverse engineering, disabling enemies quickly by overloading their systems. She could bypass sealed doors within seconds, disarm bomb triggers, shut down enemy tech and biotic abilities by using proximity mines and disable shields. She was also pretty nifty with a sniper rifle. The door's locking system was a lot older than she was used to, but she had it open within five minutes. She dragged herself in, turning off her magnetic boots. She was glad to be rid of them for now, her body feeling significantly lighter. The design of the airlock reminded her of early twenty-first century spacecraft she had seen in Alliance space training videos. The somewhat shaky digitised voice announced something very familiar.

_Equalising pressure with interior atmosphere. _Her eyes rolled over the interior, impatient to get inside. She held her submachine gun tightly in her hand. Just in case. _De-contamination in progress. _A blue screen cross back and forth over her numerous times before the computer decided she was safe enough to enter. Oxygen filled the room quickly, and she took off her helmet, taking in a large lungful of air. The doors whooshed open. Shepard was met with a very small, modest looking room. In her head she suddenly visualised a Rachni expelling jets of green poison. She was glad she didn't have to go through that again. The artificial gravity, however, didn't appear to be working. On one side was a large window, with retractable blinds. It was a single large room, off to the right was a kitchen, if you could call it a kitchen. In a corner, a small washroom barely closed off by a screen.

A yellowish glow pervaded the entire room, due to the emergency lighting. She didn't activate the main lighting, just yet. Next to the kitchen were several computer terminals built into the wall. Her eyes glided over the old, damaged technology. She looked at the dust that had gathered on the screens, a frown enveloping on her face. _What had happened here? _The place had a sense of disarray, of chaos that indicated something was taken, or something was hidden. Pieces of paper littered the air, danced around in the amber-like light. Next to the kitchen was a bunk bed, with no sheets on the mattresses. Shepard dug through one of the main lockers, the door hanging open, by the entrance door. It was filled with atmosphere suits, exploration boots and portable oxygen gear, with masks hanging down. She smelt chemical reagents in the air. She looked up slowly towards one of the air vents. Air circled normally, yet somehow she didn't trust it. Shepard walked over to one of the terminals.

Air recycling System. Seventy-six percent. What did that mean, her mind questioned. Something more acrid hung in the air, but she was unable to detect exactly what it was. She didn't check the terminals and comm system just yet. For now, she needed to treat her wounds, and perhaps think seriously. Shepard bit by bit stripped herself of her armour, once she deemed the relatively unexceptional building safe. The armour had partially been burned away, leaving in some places her arm exposed, revealing portions of white, bloody skin. Her dark red-black armour, somewhat charred from the explosion, floated gently to the ground. Underneath armour, Alliance marines usually wore an all-in-one jumpsuit, what they used to call a liquid cooling and ventilation garment. It was never the most attractive of things, but vital for space. She tore the thing off gladly, now down to a black elbow length t-shirt and shorts, letting it float off in another direction. Shepard drifted towards the bunk, shivering, and cradled into a foetal position atop the frayed mattress.  
With her eyes closed, she thought of the _Normandy_ coming apart so easily, like ripping tissue paper. The debris that was flung out at high speed as the white bulb of the explosion expanded. The blue implosion, collapsing in a cloud of dust. That everyone she knew, had fought with against the Collectors, had been wiped out within seconds.

Her burnt arms hugged her bare legs, as she lifted her head to look around vacantly. She saw the light from outside catch on the dust particles floating aimlessly. She thought about her crew. Liara who had been fascinated by her at first. She wasn't sure whether it had developed into a small crush, unlike with Kaidan where it was fairly obvious. She had inadvertently flirted with him, overcompensating her awkwardness with a joke that perhaps went too far. From the off he'd been informal with her, calling her by her surname. She stupidly overlooked this, much to her annoyance later on. Later crewmates, like Jack, she found less intimidating, unlike Miranda Lawson. Questionable crewmates, like the Krogan Grunt, took an instant liking to her; despite the fact upon their first meeting he nearly killed her. Opinions of Ashley and Pressly about the aliens aboard she didn't have time for. And Garrus. _That hurt most of all._

* * *

Half an hour later Shepard woke up. The air smelt metallic. Her limbs were unused to the strain of running with magnetic boots in low gravity, as she moved, unable to ignore her injuries. Every movement seemed difficult. Her body ached from the exhaustion, radiating from behind her eyes down to her kneecaps. She found a broken, dirty mirror above a small washbasin and was slightly speechless to see her neck, arms and hands all badly burned. She was desperate for a shower. Her dark hair, just below chin-length, gently floated around her. There were several cuts on her chin and cheek. Her large round eyes, haunted, stared back. She almost felt nervous by those eyes: eyes she'd inherited from her mother.

She applied the last of her medi-gel to her neck, but there wasn't enough for her arms and hands. She soaked a small cloth in water with difficulty and dabbed it on her back. Due to little gravity the water was hard to coordinate but luckily because of surface tension it stuck to the cloth. There was a small first aid kit floating around in one of the cupboards in the kitchen area, although it was far too small to be called a proper kitchen. She opened the tiny kit and pulled out two rolls of bandages, and enshrouded both of her bloody, red arms in them. It hurt like a damn bastard, as she gritted her teeth. Her pink back wasn't too severe; most of the burns were superficial. All the while she had Garrus's face in her head. She began to run her lightly burnt hands under cool water. When she first became Commander of the _Normandy_ and met Garrus on the Citadel, she initially admired his disregard for the rules. His dry sense of humour. His way of doing things was similar to her gut instinct. However, as a Spectre, she had to maintain some sort of good image, but eventually it didn't last long. As time went on after Cerberus revived her, she grew extremely jaded, and so had he with C-Sec. It led her to tossing the rulebook and the nice-girl book out of the window. It was beginning to hurt thinking about it. She tried to regain her bearings, looking towards the terminals, seeing if she could make sense of them.

They were nothing like she had seen before; if she had, it was in some old history video she had seen in her Alliance training. As she activated her omni-tool and scanned the terminals, she found she was still thinking about Garrus, who was now dead. There was a large lump at the back of her throat.  
She kept waving her omni-tool over the terminals that weren't destroyed, barely taking the readings in. _Her ship blown out of the sky_. It was just ridiculous. It was impossible. Against all odds, she had managed to scrape by in certain situations within an inch of her life. Which did it for her; she couldn't admit to liking it, but she did somewhat enjoy knowing she had been on the brink of death. It gave her an incentive to live when sometimes she felt she had nothing to live for. Feelings such as those had materialised after she had single-handedly fought off the Batarians when she was on Elysium. Well, they say single-handedly, earning her the status of war hero. She'd assembled a lot of audacity and not a lot of thinking. She'd only been twenty-two, with four years experience in the Alliance. What was four years? That to her was pure, dumb luck. To everyone else it was pure courage and a damn good medal. She'd basked in the glory for a while, allowing herself to become confident to the point where several months after the Blitz she'd put her name forward in the Alliance's special forces program. A year and a half later she had passed, an N7 graduate. The heroism tagged with glory was lost on her ultimately. The training nearly had her resign several times. Eventually her eyes rolled down to focus on her glowing omni-tool.

The terminals were beyond repair, and she ended up causing sparks to flare from another, even though it's screen was perfectly intact. Perhaps she would have to do things the hard way. Taking a screwdriver from on top of one of the sideboards, she unscrewed the cabinet where the terminal's control unit resided. Perhaps she could hardwire it to work again. As she sat there, fiddling about with various wires most of which was she entirely unfamiliar with, she began to ruminate again. Her arms throbbed as she moved them. Unbeknownst to her, Shepard been somewhat drawn to Garrus Vakarian from the start. Two years later when Cerberus brought her back to life, attractions had been realised, and it was rather awkward on his part. She'd been surprised at herself. She had a slightly flirtatious side she had no idea existed, which involuntarily popped out, and at times, discomfited Garrus even further. Grogginess overtook her as she sat there on the metal floor. Slowly dragging herself up, she headed towards the mattress of the lower bunk. It didn't take her long to fall asleep. She dreamt of nothing, thankfully.

* * *

It had been a couple of days, with no luck on fixing the dated terminals. After a while, she stopped pretending to herself that she understood this technology. It was simply ancient – not many computerised systems still had complex systems that had wires and circuit boards littered underneath in a small cabinet. Besides, she had grown sick of trying to perch on the ground in very little gravity, and after all the clambering around she had banged her head several times on the cabinet's ceiling. Ignoring the discomfort of her burnt arms, she kicked a chair as hard as she could across the room. The chair rather pathetically bounced across the room and landed against the side of the bunk's mattress. She folded her arms and slumped against the wall. Her eyes drifted over towards the blinds, which she had lifted up slightly. The light from the supermassive black hole caught off various pieces of broken rock outside, casting beautiful shadows of various shapes and sizes over the gravelly ground. The light reflected off her face rather beautifully, although she was unaware of it, and always had been. The only food she had managed to find was undated and vacuum packed.

Her stomach was as empty as a Krogan who hadn't seen battle. She counted how many packets of food there were, and it was only enough to last her two days if she spaced it out. The food was nondescript and tasted of something which reminded her of dry biscuits, and forced her to sip constantly from the one water bottle that was among the packets of food. God knows how old it was. Yet she desperately ignored it, for the nauseating pang of hunger. Shepard was certainly mystified by this small base, where she couldn't find a single piece of evidence of whom it belonged to, and why it was here. None of the equipment worked to provide her an answer. No disk files. She was also puzzled by the fact that the _Normandy_ had not managed to pick a reading up of the base either, despite the fact it was abandoned and its systems were not running. Shepard hadn't a clue what had happened to her squad she had assembled in the _Kodiak_. Even though the explosion would've propelled them far, it would not have so far that all three of them would have disappeared from her sight. The entire situation seemed relatively strange. As if someone purposely wanted her stranded and eventually dead on this planet.

However she wasn't sure whether it was her natural suspicion or whether it was the shock of what had happened that begun to affect her. Sweat and dirt clung to her skin as she sat there on the swivel chair, watching the isolated scenery outside, her middle and forefinger separating the blinds to form a gap. She had been watching outside for any sort of movement, any sign of evidence that had led her here. Nothing moved but the twinkle of the stars in the sky. She could only hear the slow steady beat of her heart. Her eyes ached from so steadfastly watching the bleak outside. She half hoped she'd see Garrus pop out from one from of the various large boulders in her plain sight. Tell her the _Normandy SR-2_ was still up there. That everything was fine. Nothing in her training could have prepared her for this. It could prepare her to be stranded and expect to loose crewmembers. But some of those crewmembers had become friends. Her stomach below rumbled, although she felt devoid of an appetite; those dry packages of bird food had made her feel a little green at the edges. Shepard fell asleep at the terminal desk, her head propped up on her arms. The image of a Turian donned in blue was the last image in her mind.

* * *

On the fourth day, she did half a dozen chin-ups, but failed to manage sit-ups. The low gravity was extremely irritating now. And the worst part was that chin-ups were not her strong suit. The smell of her armpits was now overwhelming. Her throat was parched from the dry biscuit-like food and her small intake of water. Her muscles ached from the greater exertion of movement in the low gravity, and the burns on her arms hurt more than they had on the first day. She re-dressed her arms and washed them with a cold compress, but that was all for now; no more medi-gel. Shepard began to take the place apart, bit by bit searching for anything. Food, extra water, just anything; something to occupy herself with. She'd inspected the vehicle outside, which was bereft of fuel and had a punctured tyre. The windscreen was smashed. The drill outside had been sat there for a long time, but still appeared good as new. She was mystified why there was no data anywhere on who ran this research facility and why. What could've they possible hoped to find underneath the surface of this rocky wasteland? By the end of the fourth day, Shepard had hit the jackpot.

Shepard pulled apart half of the floor, simply by finding an age-old screwdriver. She'd wedged it underneath one of the metal plates that made up the floor, and lifted it up. All she managed to find for a while was a set of pipes and wires, probably the plumbing and air recycling system. She determinedly pulled up each of the metal plates and on her sixth one, found a small hand-held terminal. The screen was cracked, as she stared at it for a while in her hand. Wiping off the dirt, she tried to switch it on at the side with no luck. Unscrewing it at the back, Shepard spent half an hour trying to get it to work again. Eventually, the screen flickered in front of her. It continued to flicker and fuzz for a moment, until she arrived at what was a home screen. Several audio logs were there. Tapping on one of them, she hoped the sound system wasn't broken. The voice was gruff, but certainly human.

_**2161**__. 1300 hours. We set up base here a few weeks ago after our plotted course had taken a disastrous turn for the worst. We were hoping to plot a course for the Hawking Eta, but the unchartered relay we had travelled through had thrown us northwest of the galactic core. We were lucky. System readings had transmitted codes, codes of history that were meant to be forgotten. A debris field spanned ten light years in diameter, consisting of vast numbers of ancient ships that were destroyed upon entering this treacherous system. We had already surpassed authorities; we were not mean to be in the Terminus Systems, but our research had ploughed us forward. We were looking for an artefact, according to our senior advisor, it was lying somewhere in the remnants of an underground structure on a deserted planet in the Hawking Eta system. So far, we have landed and set up a base with everything we have. The codes were changed. Readings told us it was this barren planet with no hope, no minerals, atmosphere or anything. No life-_

The audio crackled loudly and cut out. Shepard frowned, looking back at the home screen. She tapped on the next audio file, her heart beginning to beat a little faster. The next audio file had jumped in time significantly.

_**2161**__. 0000 hours. We've been here for six months, and have lost all contact with the outside world. We never planned to keep in contact with the Alliance, especially when we went off map and entered the Terminus Systems. We've drilled for the past six months and two of our crewmembers went on a small expedition to explore this dwarf planet. A week later and we assumed they had died – their supplies extinguished. All we could guess was that they had become lost, or stuck somewhere – there were plenty of craters to catch you out. _

_**2161**__. 200 hours. I sent Davison out, and he came back several hours later, barely with any oxygen left in his supply tank. But his eyes were wide with wonder, with hope - a strange thing to see after all this time. You could go crazy by yourself after a while. He and I were the only ones left. We were running low on food and water, and the artificial gravity system we had built into this small station had malfunctioned and failed to work. The tech expert was dead, a cold dead body out there in a crater somewhere. Davison I was sure had gone mad. He told me had a seen a huge dome-like building, the size of a city. He couldn't see inside it, high barriers closed it off. High guard towers dwarfed the corners of each of the barrier walls. He could see dim lights from the cracks within the dome. I was sure he was completely out of his mind. A dome? Who ran it? Who built it? Who survived in this bleak world? Was it Turian? Or something else? I shook him hard, shouting at him. Remember our mission, why we are here. The artefact. The technology. It's useless, Wyers! He began to yell back. It was all a stupid dream of yours to boost your ego. You put everyone's lives in danger. You succeeded, you bastard. I hit him and he hit back. We ended the day with blood in our mouths, scuffed knuckles and throbbing faces. _

_**2161**__. Not sure what time it is anymore. What is the point? Davison was right. I have caused the deaths of my crew. If the Alliance find me – I will be court martialled. But I have grown used to my optimism, my hope to find this alien system, this artefact, this wondrous technology. Davison went out and never came back. We've been here eight months now. He left two weeks ago and all I can guess he's find his bloody dome. And when I say dome, I mean his damn peace. Oxygen supply compromised and his body cold on the rocky ground. Good. _

_**2162**__. They have found me. Davison was right all along. The bloody bastard was right. They're bipedal all right, but they could be something else other than human. I couldn't see because of their full body armour obscuring their faces. They punctured the tyres of the Grizzly, burst the fuel can and let it soak into the ground. While they did all that outside, I suited up and re-loaded my assault rifle and my pistol. I was ready for them, if they wanted me dead. They were tapping on the door outside. Open up, they called. I was in no mood for politeness. It was quiet for five dreadful minutes. I hid behind the washroom door, my gun firmly in my hand, poised for any kind of movement. And that's when I realised the structural weakness in this facility. One of the armoured villains outside shot at the glass window. It burst on impact and the glass shattered everywhere, floating gently to the ground. It had the appearance of snow. One of them threw a grenade in. I dashed towards the main door to avoid it. When it exploded, it only let off a great plume of smoke. I passed out-_

Shepard was on the edge of her seat, as if watching a thriller. But the reek of reality was prominent. This person, whoever he was, was real and something had happened. Someone else was out here. Her finger moved to the last audio file, and tapped it gently.

_Not sure what year it is. They let me use this terminal just for this. All I can say is that they have a society. A hemmed in society that drains. It won't be long before they let me perish, or kill me outright. I'm not submitting to these bastards. They said, they said-_

The last words of the Alliance crewmember crackled and fuzzed out. Shepard stared at the terminal for a matter of five seconds, and then threw it onto the ground as hard as she could. With as much force she could muster, she stamped the thing to smithereens with the heel of her boot. The screen cracked further, its structure gave way, and pieces of the inside equipment erupted outwards onto the floor. Whoever killed the Alliance crewmember had placed the terminal back in this facility and had fixed the window. She counted how many days she had been here.  
Nearly five. Surely they would've detected her now? She paced and paced for the next hour until she couldn't pace anymore. She began to lament the fact she had destroyed the terminal beyond repair – what happens if she could find a way of communication with it? But there were no buoys out here to grant her that communication to the outside world, to the extranet. _Perhaps it was all in the man's head._ Or maybe it wasn't – she could gain this society's upper hand and find a way out of here. Surely they had ships docked at this dome-like structure. For now, her mind was taken off the _Normandy's_ destruction. Shepard had her mojo back – something worth investigating, something worth fighting for. The sooner she got off this planet, the sooner she could get back to the Alliance and tell them what had happened. Get revenge for the destruction of the _Normandy_ – whoever they were, she'd get them.

* * *

It was the sixth day, and she hadn't eaten for thirty-five hours. All the food had run out, and somehow she was thankful for it. The food had given her a bout of diarrhoea, dehydration, and a sore throat – it was so dry it could barely pass down her throat. She had suited up, but not in her N7 armour. Her boots were still useful, but she grabbed a lighter body armour from the cupboard. After a couple of minutes she was suited and booted. She found a helmet and an incredibly old oxygen tank attached – usually breathing systems were currently inbuilt into the armour and helmet. Shepard refilled it from a small airtight container that was housed in a small compartment on the wall at the front of the building.

It took five minutes, but the sound of the oxygen being pumped into the tank was strangely comforting. She had lived with silence for too long. It was surprising to see there was oxygen available, considering the building had been abandoned years ago. Shepard was still staring at the tank when a piercing bright white light shone through the blinds on her right. Her head snapped up. The simultaneous feeling of relief and dread hit her at once. Her curbed instincts kicked in. Shepard shut the oxygen tank off and placing her helmet on her head. Grabbing her submachine gun, she peered ever so slightly through the blinds. She could ever so slightly make out a dome-like vehicle sat outside, shaking slightly. She couldn't hear the engine but by the movement of its exterior clearly meant the engine was running. There wasn't much else to see, for the piercing light.

Dread slowly filled her. They were coming for her like they had with Wyers, the research scientist last here twenty-four years ago. She grabbed her sniper rifle, although her current suit did not have a magnetic holster. Snapping open a tiny compartment at the back of the Widow, she pulled out a small harness and slung the weapon over her back. The suit did not provide much in the way of armour; she'd have to take cover instantly. She was very much naked in the sight of the enemy. She wasn't going to wait inside like a sitting duck, however. Shepard bashed at the crack in the middle of the washbasin's mirror with the butt of her gun. Pieces of it fell into the sink. When she opened the front door, peering round from behind the wall, nothing was there to greet her. Shepard slowly inched her way around the outside of the building, avoiding the bright light of the vehicle. Taking the piece of the mirror out of her pocket, she moved it so whatever was behind her was in view. Despite the blinding light, she saw a large hovering assault drone beside the vehicle. However, the little piece of broken mirror must have caught off the bright light shining towards her, because they began shooting. Shepard activated her magnetic boots and began to run as fast as her body could carry her to the nearest crater. Taking cover behind the crater's wall, she unslung her sniper rifle from behind her back. Thrusting the weapon's spiked heels into the rocky ground, she looked through the scope.

Several human soldiers had emerged in front of the bright light, weapons in their hands. She desperately wished she had her armour: a tactical cloak would be extremely useful at this point. She pressed her finger against the trigger, after adjusting her scope. Usually the force of the gun and the incredible sound would send a tremor down her arms. However it was different in little gravity. She managed to take down at least two of the soldiers in a short space of time. However, the somewhat terrifying drone honed in on her only a few seconds after she fired her weapon. Something hard struck her in the shoulder, propelling her two metres backwards. The starry sky above her, Shepard tried to regain her breath despite the pain in her shoulder. Her eyes closed quickly.


	4. Unlikely Enemies

When Commander Shepard woke up, everything was white. It reminded her of the time she briefly woke when Cerberus were still rebuilding her. As she lay there, slowly but surely the feeling returned to her limbs. Wherever she was, there was artificial gravity, as a great weight pulled her down. It was difficult to adjust to considering she had spent nearly a week in very little gravity. Her eyes took a while to amend. She realised she'd been sedated with something extremely potent. Her shoulder ached where the drone had hit her with a sedation bullet. She lifted her head up ever so slightly, craning her neck. It was a small, fairly empty sterile room. The walls were so white that the reflection from the bright light made her eyes ache. It didn't contain much; cupboards built into the wall, an examination table with wheels cleared of utensils. The floor was so shiny she could see everything in the room reflected.

Something seemed incredibly abnormal. There was no sign of her previous armour and weapons, and she was dressed in a white tunic and trousers. Her arms were patched up in new dressings. Nothing inside indicated it was a medical bay, yet the cleanliness and strange smell of sterile chemicals indicated otherwise. After five minutes, Shepard regained her strength. There was no mirror, but she used the shiny floor to assess her shoulder, which throbbed tremendously. Her shoulder was black, stark against the rest of her white skin. Standing back up, her eyes whipped around the room. No windows, and one door. She felt around the door and around the walls, for any give, any sign. She tried to dismantle the small examination trolley with no success. Shepard clambered onto the bed, steadying herself in the heavy gravity. Standing at five foot eight, she was tall enough to reach up to press her hands against the ceiling panels. She tried several of them without any success. When she moved the bed over far enough and began to feel a give in the ninth panel, she heard movements on the other side of the door. No voices, only light footsteps, and there was no time for her to move back to where she had been. A man and woman, clothed in white tunics like her, entered. Their faces remained straight despite the fact she was stood wobbling on the bed.

"Who are you?" she demanded, but her voice was hoarse and didn't come out the way she wanted it to.

"Please, miss, you still haven't fully recovered, get down from the bed," urged the woman, although Shepard didn't fall for this bedside manner whatsoever. Her eyes switched to the man, whose eyes were pitiless. She was confident she could overpower one of them, but seeing the man had a device that could sedate her, she refrained from lashing out. The woman's smile was falsely sympathetic. The man remained completely stoical as he analysed her movements. Shepard carefully climbed down from the bed without letting it roll across the room, keeping her eyes trained on them.

"How long have I been here?" she tried again. Her voice was unrelenting in its dryness. The man held up a datapad and took her readings, all without her permission. She hadn't a clue why he wasn't using an omni-tool.

"You've been here ten hours," confirmed the woman. "Please, sit back down and rest." The woman tried to smile again. Shepard didn't move, crossing her arms.

"My ship was destroyed by _a missile_. I have lost all my crew. I want to know what happened, and _why_ I was fighting your soldiers ten hours ago. Where am I? A Cerberus base?" she said, her voice getting higher and harder.

"You've had a rough journey," the woman continued. It took us several hours to get you here, we weren't sure you were going to make it. Unfortunately we've no details on our logs that an explosion occurred within the last one hundred and forty eight hours. I'm sorry you lost your crew. Our soldiers are only to protect and conserve. You were already ill. We will enter you into our recovery program for now. Once you've recovered we can log your details." Shepard noticed a stunning weapon in the man's holster, strapped to his belt. Spiteful

"I don't want you to log my details or enter me into any program," snapped Shepard. "I want you to answer my questions." Her patience was running out rapidly.

"You've no right to make demands under our jurisdiction," interrupted the man. His voice was calm and silky enough that it raised the hairs on the back of Shepard's neck. She stood forward, leaning far enough so that his face was too close for comfort.

"You're not going to get _any_ answers out of me, until you let me out of this Goddamn room. My ship was destroyed. I've been in an abandoned base for six days. You think I'm interested to listening to _your_ threats?"

Whatever was coming out of her mouth her brain had no say in. She was running on pure adrenaline. Shepard reached for the man's stunner, but he seemed prepared for her attack. Her grabbed her wrist, then twisted her arm behind her back so hard her shoulder cracked. He pushed her to the floor, with his hand still firmly on her arm. Shepard mustered enough to force the back of her head into the man's face. Shortly she heard the angered bellow of pain, as something had satisfyingly cracked: hopefully his nose.

As he staggered backwards, she made a grab for the stunner, ready to round on the woman. However the woman was already behind her with a syringe. As Shepard reached for the man's stunner, the woman slammed one hand down on Shepard's shoulder, and the other plunged the syringe into her neck. She decompressed it fast enough, even though Shepard threw her off so that she was flung against the bed. Shepard dropped the stunner, so that it clattered loudly on the floor. Her knees wobbled as she reached out of the examination cart in front of her. The woman watched Shepard fall, not making any effort to soften the impact. Shepard's hand missed the edge of the cart and her heavy body plunged forward. Everything vanished once more.

* * *

It was nothing but Shepard's own kind of private hell. The man and woman came in every day after the first. They'd question her; she'd attempt to fight, was seemingly overpowered and then sedated for sixteen hours. On the fourth attempt, a solider was brought into the room. His gun was aimed at her head the entire time they interrogated her. _Who were her crew? Who was she working for?_ She decided it was best not to tell them anything, not even her name. It was clear they were not going to listen to her, even if she told them she was Alliance. She'd leave the part about Cerberus out. Their plain, somewhat affable manner at times was disconcerting, even if a gun was pointed at her head on occasion. She counted the days down each time she woke up after they sedated her. Her dressings were changed daily, and her burns were healing well.

There was a purple mark on the side of her neck where the syringe had been stabbed in to sedate her each time. Every question they asked her, she'd ask one in return with no response. On one day when Shepard had awoken earlier than she was supposed to, she immediately went back to finding a loose plate in the ceiling. Not one would come loose, even the previous she'd discovered. Her muscles clenched in desperation. Nothing was on her mind except escape, a useful distraction given the situation.

_No crew, no ship, stuck on a mysterious planet with armed, hostile people._ They didn't tell her who they were, how long they had been here, and why they were here. When she heard them approach the door again, lighter footsteps indicating there wasn't a soldier present this time, she jumped down immediately. Shepard got back into the bed, closing her eyes. As usual, the nameless pair walked in. Her eyes were not completely closed; the man and woman were dressed in the same bland tunics. Not wanting another syringe pushed into her neck, Shepard opened her eyes.

"Ah, you're awake," the woman smiled at her.

"Guess you didn't give me_ enough_ of it last time." Shepard gave the woman an equally bright smile.

The woman's superficial pleasantness always frightened Shepard far more than the stony stare belonging to the man. There was no stunner and no visible syringe in sight this time, which was different. Different meant something to be worried about. Shepard was well aware her hair hadn't been washed for however long she had been stuck in this ghastly room, and that she stunk to high-heaven. She had been refused food since she had denied them satisfactory answers and had struggled each time they had sedated her. She wasn't going to let these bastards win. By now, she reckoned she had spent nearly two weeks on this bleak dwarf planet.

"I'm Alliance Navy," Shepard said, once she sat up. They both stood there, watching her carefully. Her legs wobbled as she forced her feet onto the cold floor, her heart pounding hard. To appear weak in the face of the enemy when all she wanted to do was pound them flat into the ground was humiliating. She couldn't back down now, not after this, not after Saren, Sovereign and the Collectors. Both eyes of the pair held certain knowingness. Were they going to discard her after their little experiment?

"I was a Commander of a ship, the _Canterbury_," said Shepard, trying to keep her voice desperately straight.

"Your name?" the man asked.

"Williams," Shepard said. "Commander R.F Williams of the Alliance Navy. We were heading to a research station."

"What were you researching?" quizzed the woman. Shepard's mind had to work quickly. She also had to keep her expression completely straight. She wasn't terrible at telling lies, but she wasn't brilliant at them either.

"It's classified Alliance information, I'm afraid. I don't think that bears any significance on why you've brought me here," she said, her voice beginning to loose her shakiness.

"I think that's _too_ convenient of an answer," the man said. Shepard glared at him, close to losing her temper. The woman left the room, giving Shepard one last sympathetic smile. Two extra men, both armed and dressed in white coats, entered. One of them towered over everyone else in the room.

"You're going to be working for us now. You're going to forget whomever you worked for before," said the first man. Shepard didn't move, but her heart began to palpitate, like a hammer on cloth. She assessed each corner of the room, without moving her eyes from the man in front of her.

"I tend to know whom I work for before I agree to work _for_ them," she countered. The only escape was the door, guarded by the two men. She had the trolley bed to throw in their way and the metal cart to shield herself with. She had her skills, but she didn't have much in the way of strength, thanks to them.

"Everyone ends up working for us. We have created a better society, Commander Williams. You read Wyers' account - he joined us. It was the best decision he'd made. Our society is free from the evil of technology; free from the mistakes we as a species have created over decades. Progressing will only hinder us, progressing will only endanger us and force us to cooperate with lesser species. Our way is the only way forward. We want you to join us, we only want to expand our society," said the man. It was the longest he'd ever spoken. Shepard gaped at him briefly after he finished talking.

"I think you're utterly delusional," she said in disbelief. "Are you aware of _anything_ that is going on in the galaxy at the moment?" The man stepped forward, smirking at her. _Oh, how she wanted to wipe it off. _

"The only delusional one, is _you_, Williams," he replied. "We have removed your weapons and your armour. They will be no good to you now. Do you know how many people we have integrated into our society?"

"Probably not that many considering you live on a planet beyond the Omega-4 Mass Relay," muttered Shepard. The man ignored her, and signalled to the two men standing at the door.

"We will erase your mistakes. Starting with that chip in your arm," he said, the tone of his voice changing.

She suddenly rammed the heel of her hand into his nose. It took half a second for him to stumble away, less than half a second for blood to appear all over his face. The white of his tunic was soon spotted with red. Shepard then propelled the trolley bed at the nearest guard. The force of the trolley had made the guard stumble, making him drop an electrified baton from his belt. It skidded slightly across the room, but before she could kick it up with her foot into her arms, the other guard had sprung over his partner keeling on the floor. A two hundred pound, six foot four man forced Shepard into the ground. Weakened from no food and constant sedation, Shepard was instantly crumpled by the man's weight. Her head hit the cold, tiled floor beneath her and for a moment she saw purple dots dance in her vision as she bit her tongue in pain.

The impact of her skull hitting the ground had disorientated her enough for several seconds, giving the guards time to haul her up into a chair. The man she'd given a bloody nose started handing out orders to the guards angrily. They'd set up a small table, which looked like when deactivated was stored inside a compartment in the wall. A chair had appeared, white as the rest of the room. She collapsed under the brunt force of the guards, her buttocks slapping against the base of the chair. From that moment on, the shock she'd felt and the speed of the situation made her feel like it was a hallucination. One of the guards pulled the bandage off her left arm, exposing peeling raw-red skin. The other kept her firmly in the chair. From a large pocket at the front of his tunic, the first man pulled out what looked like a scalpel.

"You have no choice but to cooperate," he said, calmer now.

His nose was still bleeding, still dripping continuously onto his tunic. His blue eyes stood out, staring at her, teasing a reply out of her. She only stared at him, holding his gaze steadily. He took her forearm firmly, feeling up the underside skin with the pads of his fingers. He stopped after what seemed like hours, and she fixed him a glare. If you ever needed the omni-tool implant removed or replaced, local anaesthetic was applied. The procedure only took less than ten minutes. The man in front of her must have removed implants before, for he knew the exact location of hers. The first stab of the scalpel was barely noticeable; it was his ploughing underneath the surface of the skin that was excruciating. Shepard struggled underneath the guard's weight, but it only worsened the pain radiating from her arm up into her shoulder.

After locating the implant, he jerked it forcefully out of her arm, making her struggle against the guards who held her. She had experienced worse pain, but the barefaced sadism seemed to make it hurt more than it should've. The man plopped the barely visible implant into a petri dish. There was more blood than she realised, all over the table. The guard holding her arm down loosened his grip, and stepped away when he was sure she was not going to retaliate. He wiped her bloody arm with a cloth in one smooth streak. Mockingly, he tattooed a six-digit number into the same arm. The fine tip of the needle scratched deep into her skin, producing more blood. Shepard stared at him the entire time. Oh how she wanted to wipe that derisive expression off his face. The desire for it was so great, her body tensed up in anticipation, ready to strike at the next possible moment. Her eyes quickly flicked down to the number, 62-01-88.

"Is that my new identity?" she spat, momentarily surprised she had still had a voice. Her arm throbbed. The guard behind hauled her up out of the chair.

"You are part of a better scheme, better than some others. We are improving our society. You will be put to work on digging a foundation for a new building."

"I thought you were against progress," said Shepard. She could feel warm blood cascading down her arm, down to tips of her fingers.

"Your kind of progress," he answered simply.

Despite the caked blood all over his face and tunic, this didn't hinder his obvious menace. There wasn't any more to time to converse with him; she was hauled out of the little white room that had been her prison. After walking down an endless white corridor, the guard pushed her outside before a truck. The heat was stifling and overhead was intensely bright light. She had to cover her eyes in brief pain. They didn't wait for her to adjust her vision however, and pushed her into the back of the vehicle. She felt around in the dark for seating, but failed to continue when the vehicle took off, forcing her against one of the walls inside. The impact wouldn't have mattered if she hadn't had an injured arm. The hellish journey, thankfully, only lasted ten minutes.


	5. Hell

It must have been a good ten minutes before the doors of the truck opened again.

"Out, now!" one of the guards barked.

The ground beneath her was soft and earthy when she jumped out of the truck. They walked her towards a ten-foot long line of people, where she was handed a new pair of white trousers and a tunic. The queue was moving towards a small hut, crudely set up. Her eyes roved over the scenery. A large area of incomplete dug-up ground sat in front of her. As she craned her neck subtly, she saw that hundreds of metres above was a huge glassy dome, with a bluish shield flickering over it. _Wyers in the audio log was painfully right_. A bright light shone high up from the middle of the dome, she guessed it was a light source of some kind. It was intensely powerful; she had no idea what the source of this power was. It was some sort of ecological dome. Trees and shrubs were seen everywhere, lush in their growth with buildings in the distance. Some of the buildings, painfully dull, were higher than others, but none of them warranted a skyscraper status. The streets were devoid of vehicles, apart from a couple of large Mako-like trucks with armed guards hanging off the back.

She didn't think it was possible to make a Mako ominous. Apparently it was. The air was oppressive in the silence, and she could feel sweat rolling down her temples and back. She glanced briefly at her bloodied arm. She ripped the lower part of her tunic off and looped it tightly round her wound. She had to work out some kind of plan, anything. Guards marched around the digging site. By the time she reached the front of the line, not one person had spoken to her. They asked to see her number on her arm, and she had to unwind her makeshift bandage once more. The two women sat at the table barely acknowledged her, and waved her on. Before entering, Shepard saw they were close to the edge of the dome. Outside it was guarded by a twenty foot fence, with guard towers that ran every ten metres alongside or so. Inside the empty hut, people of both sexes were changing into another plain set of tunics. The only noise was the ruffling of fabric. Trying to stay inconspicuous, Shepard found a corner and stripped herself. She removed her clothes angrily, discarding it on the floor in haste, realising she had no underwear. The new garment contained that same antiseptic smell; it was what this place seemed to stink of. Suddenly a woman's face smiled on the screen above them.

"We are Aegeus, we are humanity's future," she droned on.

Shepard saw some people nod their heads in unison, some were impassive. The guards, who yelled over the heads of the crowd, ushered them outside. No one screamed or cried in fright. Shepard was thrust outside along with the huddle, nearly losing her footing. They all quickly took a shovel from the left tables as Shepard tried to get lost in the crowd. From the corner of her eye she saw one of the large assault drones, its red light glaring, that had been outside the abandoned base a week ago. The guards were marshalling them on aggressively, into a new untouched area of soil. Shepard plunged the tip of the shovel into the soft soil. _The planet had nothing. Had they manufactured this? To create some semblance of normality?_ They obviously had no contact with the outside world. They barely blinked when she had mentioned the Alliance. The questions they asked her seemed empty; there was no purpose behind them. They had wanted to frighten her into submission. The behaviour of everyone else around her seemed peculiar. In the deadly silence they dug as the drones watched over them.

Every inch of her body was covered in sweat. Shepard had never gone this long without food. It had been nearly a week since she had lost the _Normandy_. To her astonishment, two people near her began to talk, their whispers frantic. The woman was murmuring for the man to quieten. It went on for a couple more minutes before the large drone rounded on the woman's partner. A single red line shot out. The man was hit square in the forehead, and his body crumpled to the ground, facedown in the soil. The woman contained her cry of horror, digging faster than she had done before. Shepard watched this from the corner of her eye. Her hands, after two hours of digging, were beginning to chafe on the wooden handle of the shovel. The drone had killed two more people in those hours, which amounted to four when they signalled for a brief respite.

Everyone sat down, soaked in their own sweat. Shepard's hair stuck to the back of her neck, her body trembling with gnawing hunger. The soles of her feet were completely brown. Her arm pulsed with the same rhythm as her heart. Above everything else, she felt incensed by the ignorance displayed by these people. Many throughout the universe were ignorant and disbelieving of the Reapers. This organisation of people didn't want to know what was happening beyond their planet. By the time four hours passed, Shepard was ready to collapse. They were soon directed to a larger building elsewhere, which was ten minutes down a long road, clear of people except soldiers.

One man nodded at her, silently as they walked to the back of the line. It was easy to get lost in the long line of workers. Some of the buildings were run down, almost unnoticeable. The man, with two other accomplices, turned into the alleyway between two dilapidated buildings. The bright white light above the city had been turned off. It seemed no one here ran by a specific time. She wasn't sure what the three people, two men and one woman, were planning to do, but if it meant escaping, she was with them. They continued to run down the blackened streets. Her bare feet caught on small pieces of shingle, provoking a grunt from her. The drone behind them buzzed and hummed.

"Keep running! Keep running!" screamed the man in front. He was the first to be shot. Shepard threw herself on the ground, behind a dumpster. The end of the street came to a close; a large wall barred off the escapees. The drone shot the two remaining fugitives. Shepard lay on the ground, staring at the reflective shimmering prison above her. She tried not to move. The drone however, shone its piercing light over her. The guards from behind it appeared out of nowhere, guns drawn.

"Get up," one of them ordered. Shepard slowly stood up, holding her hands up in fatigue. It took another ten minutes to walk in silence, with the threat of the drone behind them. She saw a familiar white building. Back to the sterile room it was, then.

* * *

The torment was only just beginning. Shepard was back in the sterile white room. Her feet were still caked in dry mud and her arm was still swathed in bloody makeshift bandages. There was a bowl of water on the floor. This incensed her so much that she kicked it across the room. She didn't even want to feel regret at wasting the water, seeing it shining on the tiled floor. Shepard didn't have to wait long before a smartly-dressed woman in her late forties waltzed in. Her hands were clasped together, and this time she didn't smile. Shepard was stood awkwardly in the room, trying to keep her back as straight as possible. She didn't want to kneel in front of these people. The woman pressed a switch on the side of the room once Shepard was sure no one else was going to enter. A small white slab emerged from the wall. The woman waved her hand towards the slab. Shepard, persevering, completely ignored the woman's gesture.

"Please, Commander Williams. I think it will do you good," said the woman. Shepard glared at her.

"Why care now? What does it matter?" she answered. The woman signalled towards the seat more firmly this time, pursing her lips. Shepard eventually sat down, deciding her stubbornness wouldn't get her very far. The woman, who was taller, dwarfed over her as she sat.

"We give you work after you refuse to say anything else," said the woman. "Yet, we find you _conspiring_ with criminals who are desperate to communicate with an outside world! An outside world that does not exist."

"You are deluded," Shepard replied, standing up again, regaining some semblance of strength. "Whatever fantasy you are living needs to end. A real war will start soon. A war with the Reapers. Does that not mean anything to you?"

"You are feeding those around you lies," snapped the woman. "We cannot have you taint what we've been working so long to eradicate!"

"Why are you heedlessly killing people here? Putting them to work for days on end, where it's certain they'll die either from exhaustion or a laser bullet from one of your drones!" Shepard shouted. The woman stood back, putting her hands in her pockets. She gave a smile Shepard couldn't categorise.

"Well, Williams. You'll no longer have to worry. We'll take care of you. Our society needs to preserve. You trespassed and no one trespasses. Not without accepting our society," she said.

"You're-" began Shepard. The woman turned away towards the door, letting a couple of guards stomp into the room. The first guard knocked her to the floor and dealt a heavy kick to her gut, completely winding her. As she lay on the floor, she heard the woman's hateful voice.

"Goodbye, Commander Williams of the _Canterbury_…" The woman's white figure disappeared beyond the familiar doors. The guard stuck a stunner between her shoulder blades. Half a dozen electrical volts jolted through her body, making her yell in agony. Her body convulsed for several moments, before she completely lost consciousness.

_Hell._

* * *

Shepard was refused food again for two days, and spent most of her time asleep on the trolley bed. They gave her a bowl of water, but on the third day she was too weak to get up to retrieve it. Her limbs were sore from the guard's earlier beatings. For the first two days, they left her in darkness, yet she was grateful for it. The other two they switched the lights back on, which felt worse. After four days, she was served food. Whatever in the food had caused her to fall asleep for how long, she did not know. It was dry and plain and she slept for hours on end. It was as if they were trying a new tactic on her – to sleep long periods, with no recollection of where she was when she woke up.

For two days they'd give her drugged food, for the following two days they'd give her nothing but water. Then they'd leave her in darkness. It continued for a long time, to the point where she began to have dreams. It wouldn't be about the nightmare she'd been dragged into. It wasn't about the Collectors, or the death of her crew or even Garrus. She dreamt about a home that was aeons away now. She barely gave a thought to her parents these days, yet they were so vivid in her dreams. It made her suspect something had been put into the drugs. The constant drowsiness and constantly being plunged into claustrophobic darkness didn't allow her any space to think of how to escape. Then they didn't give her food for another three days. _Oh God, help me._

* * *

_She'd been closer to her mother, who'd always been the calmer one. Her father was constantly riddled with anxiety about the state of the farm, the funds in the bank and what others thought of him and his business. Both of them had been very much involved in their trade and had Shepard later in their years. Her mother had her when she'd been forty-two, her father forty-four. She used to get into fights in the juniors, once having been suspended. When she'd become a teen, quietness and acne had overtaken her. Her parents were not as liberal as others, considering they were twenty years older than most of them. Her first sexual experience didn't occur until the years between the death of her parents and enlisting. She had a sloppy kiss at a school disco once, but that didn't count. The first kiss was from some guy at work, when she used to bus tables. It was probably one of the worst jobs in the world and it spanned nearly a year and a half. They'd been making eyes at each other for a month. She eventually had enough. He lived in a small apartment in a run-down area of Elysium's capital. She saw him twice, and quit her job a week later to join the Alliance. She'd been eighteen only for a month. It seemed all she had._

* * *

Commander Shepard began to go through a period where she was unsure about the state of her consciousness. All she knew was they were torturing her and had been doing so for a while. The dreams or hallucinations she'd been having formed as memories, only more intense and distorted. The only things she felt were the certain sounds and images of her memories: The lined faces of her parents or the way the sky looked during the second season. Everything within these dreams was entirely familiar to her, sometimes pleasant. She was removed from the white and black room, from her prison, that hellish dome. When she began to suffer from unpleasant memories, she could hear someone whispering to her, as if they were reaching out to her consciousness. The important figures in her life would chastise her. Anderson, who'd tell her she hadn't worked hard enough. Her father would state she had never tried at school. Her peers during adolescence would say to her she needed to relax more.

_The only reason you live is because you want to defeat the Reapers. That's all you have. What will you have left if they are ever defeated? What then? _

It stung, as if she agreed with this strange voice.

_What do you have, Shepard? Farmers for parents and potluck. You're a ' war hero', that's what they call you. A revered 'celebrity', although you hate that title. You never liked the title of Spectre either, even if you were the first official human to gain the entitlement. You never liked how after the Skyllian Blitz, everyone thought of you as some sort of 'saint'. Saint Shepard… _

She wasn't sure how long it had been now. They were slowly but surely indoctrinating her. They were going to make her into a drone, like all the other workers out there digging away. She couldn't feel her aching bruised body anymore, smell her dirt caked on her skin, or feel alive. No more food, no more water. No more light.

* * *

_The colony we lived on wasn't like some of the others, even though it was one of the first few established. But it was still all work. I had notorious hay fever in the summer, surrounded by open air and vast fields. We couldn't afford as much medicine and technology. My hay fever went uncured most of the time. We were lucky to have our own lodgings. Many people lived in large apartments, all housed together. We were all farmers. I didn't do much as a kid. I played with our dog in the large open fields. We didn't have a garden. As a teenager I was home by eight, no later. Everyone worked; the farms were our lives. One day my father had taken me to the beach. No one ever went there,_ _and it wasn't like Earth's beaches. But I remember the sound of the waves, the bright horizon. The slight difference between the planets was the colour of the sky. The star that gave our planet sustenance was younger than Earth's sun, so the light particles were different. My father picked up a small pebble and skimmed it across the sea._

_He told me about the seasons and about the tide, similar to Earth's. I didn't always take it in. It was all too scientific for me. I just watched the waves, washing in and out. The water bobbed up and down in the distance. I remember the first time I'd really disappointed them. They were old and didn't understand teenagers. And I was one hell of a teen. Mom made a Polish stew. She'd met Pa in Toronto, back on Earth. They moved here a few years before they had me. I used to love the stew they'd make. That day, I told them I arranged to have it round Ren and Lesli's house. My father looked like I wasn't his for a brief moment. He had never looked at me like that before. He wouldn't do so again, but it was one of those moments when something changes forever._

* * *

Freezing water was splashed on her face. Shepard flung herself upwards, heaving and coughing frantically. She'd been lying on that single bed for a week. She was so startled that she had flung herself right off the trolley bed. The floor was cold and hard, and her limbs trembled as she struggled to get back onto her feet. Shepard looked up at two pairs of white boots, as she breathed. She was _alive_. Her vision swayed in front of her. Someone above her was shouting and her ears rang with the sound of it. They'd drugged her up to her eyeballs and she still couldn't get up, completely incoherent. Two hands hauled her up, onto her feet. Swaying, Shepard tried to focus on the figure in front of her. The figure suddenly yanked Shepard's shirt off, catching an ear in the process. The air was sharp and biting. Refusing to be humiliated further, Shepard mustered whatever dignity she had, and removed her trousers swiftly. The figure produced a new white bundle, pressed and clean. Her brief nudity didn't faze her anymore. When she was dressed, the figure produced another syringe.

"It's to stabilise you," they affirmed. Shepard didn't believe them, but didn't have the strength to refuse. A minute later after she'd been administered the shot, Shepard's nausea and lethargy seemed to vanish. The woman in front of her was young, but her lips were pursed. She didn't like wasting time either, apparently.

"You are being sent to a rehabilitation centre," she stated, watching Shepard steadily. Shepard's eyes quickly moved over the hateful room.

"I thought I _was_ being rehabilitated," she replied. Her voice sounded metallic, due to neglect. The woman blinked, looking as if she hadn't understood.

"You are being sent to the women's camp," she repeated, her voice unusually high.

"Oh, _right_. So I was being tortured then?" said Shepard. The woman didn't react, but moved towards the door.

"You have ten minutes before the truck leaves for the camp," she announced, as if Shepard wanted to bid her goodbyes to the room.

"Can I have a shower? And _maybe_ some medi-gel for my arm?" Shepard asked.

She moved closer to the woman, her mind thinking quickly. The door was still closed. Shepard quickly dealt a blow to the woman's face, knocking her backwards into the wall. However, she wasn't prepared for the woman to immediately recover. With a snarl, she kicked open the door before Shepard could deal another painful knock to her abdomen. Stupidly turning her back on Shepard as she kicked the door open, the woman gave her enemy a significant advantage. Shepard threw herself on top of her, driving her into the ground. The two women plunged ahead, the slap of flesh evident against the hard metal floor. Growling and snarling, the woman's arms flailed about, trying to throw Shepard off. She then began to call for help, her voice strangled. Shepard took the back of her head and slammed it hard into the cold floor below. There was the painful sound of bone crunching against metal. The woman was instantly silenced. Straightaway Shepard felt around her body for any useful weapons, coming across a stunner.

Standing back up, she stared down the vacant corridor. It stretched for several metres, before meeting a large doorway. She remembered the door required a code. There wasn't enough time. Running back into the room that housed her for a fortnight, Shepard grabbed the hateful trolley bed, after moving the woman's unconscious body towards the wall. She didn't get very far with her plan, however. Someone must have been alerted to her presence, thanks to the woman's strangled cries. Shepard could hear armed guards race down the corridor, the sound of their heavy boots bouncing off the walls. Before the first one could intercept her, Shepard threw the bed over to block his path, activating the stunner. Electrical sparks flew off the end. She drove it roughly into the side of his exposed neck. Screaming in agony, the guard's electrified body jerked and contracted for a few seconds before he dropped heavily to the ground. It was several minutes before the next guard entered the room, almost as if he was waiting for her to step out. _Idiot, _she smiled to herself.

It gave Shepard the delightful opportunity to grab the incapacitated guard's single pistol from his holster, as he lay unconscious. She fired it off through the door, as a warning shot. The guard's fall had thankfully moved the trolley out of her path. She crouched beside the wall, holding the pistol tightly in her hand. There was heavy breathing to her left, just behind the wall. The other guard, unfortunately, was faster than her even though it sounded like he was more afraid. Before she could put a round in his leg or groin, probably the latter as she was pissed off, his gloved hand slammed into her neck. Yelping with a surprise, Shepard grabbed the arm that drove her backwards into the ground. The man's hand squeezed her neck tightly.

"Drop the pistol," he hissed with barely contained rage.

Instead, she hit him hard across the face with it. Enraged, the guard slammed the pistol out of hand with brute force. She was sure she had broken his nose, and for a moment she thought he had broken one of her fingers. With one last movement, the guard slammed her head against the ground, much like she had done with the previous woman. Her teeth rattled in her jaw. Black spots popped in her vision. The guard above her took out what looked like a transmitter, holding it to his mouth and calling for backup. He drew his eyes back to her.

"We got you now, you bitch," he spat at her. Her eyes were fixed on him, despite her fuzzed vision.

"How original," she responded.

"You killed that woman, out there," he said, his neck cabled with tendons. Shepard watched him steadily, surprised at the amount of blood that could pour out of the nose. "You will pay for your crimes. We will _tear_ your mind apart." He finished off his threat, spraying bloody spit onto her face.

"Which part of that is supposed to shock me?" Shepard told him, wiping away the blood on her face. She wasn't sure why she was tempting fate. It was too late for now. The other guards walked calmly into the room. The man on top of her grabbed the front of her blood-smeared tunic and hauled her upwards. Sweat broke through the fine layer of dust and dirt on her face.

"She killed Leann! She _murdered_ her! Execute her!" he began shouting at the two guards. They ignored him, as they took her back down the hallway.


	6. A Familiar Voice

Shepard bided her time. This specific camp housed just women. Each day they were forced to do something mindless like digging for hours on end. On the first evening, she was permitted to wash in a grimy public showering room. The other women, who showered with her, barely noticed her or each other. She didn't think she could enjoy a shower this much, as old blood and dirt combined together, running off her warm body. A small bar of unscented soap was given to her and she hid it in her pocket.

On the third evening, she heard a high keening wail. Drying off quickly, Shepard threw her white tunic and trousers on, including a pair of white plimsolls. She was extremely thankful for a pair of shoes at last. The wailing grew higher and more urgent. Drying the ends of her hair with a towel, Shepard slowly inched towards the edge of the doorway. Further along the grimy corridor on her right, was a large group of women, standing there. It appeared as if they were watching something. She didn't want to watch much more. Leaving the commotion in the corridor, she analysed the shower room. A single window was at the bottom of the wall, barely letting in light. Small, but big enough to fit through, she thought. Facing the doorway, with the back of her right heel, she kicked the glass out of the window, bit by bit. It didn't take much, and shattered easily.

Watching the doorway for a few moments more, Shepard plunged through the window headfirst. Below her, gravelly dirt: Ahead of her, a chain link fence. The building itself was not guarded. It disturbed her somewhat to think that they presumed there wouldn't be attempted escape, due to the nature of their indoctrination techniques. It was nightfall as she crept alongside the front of the building, towards a dank street. She knew there were patrols scouting the streets. The air smelt earthy and metallic. There was no atmosphere, no breeze in the air. It was still, and silent, carrying a deadly aura.

Small unlit slums, beside the large industrial estate, went on seemingly for miles. A dog barked in the distance. As Shepard began to tread slowly down the street, her feet were inch deep in mud. Seeing an empty building, it's large window indicating it used to be some sort of café, Shepard jumped through the broken glass and behind a counter. The ground shook slightly beneath her. Below her feet was fetid. She wasn't sure whether it was mud, dirt or something else as she crouched there desperately, holding her breath. From underneath the metal counter, she saw a truck slowly pass. A guard, an assault rifle poised in his hand, jumped off the back. The truck emitted bright light; the only light she had seen so far.

"Good place to stop," came the muffled voice of the driver. Her legs began to ache as she crouched on her haunches. But she wasn't moving now, placing a hand to muffle her breathing.

"Yeah, but I thought I saw something down here," replied the nearby voice of the other guard with the weapon. They shone a bright white light into the café, passing round the room slowly. She stayed as physically immobile as possible.

"Your imagination?" chuckled the driver.

The white light stayed there for a few minutes. They seemed more coherent than any other person she'd met here. She began to wonder if it was even possible to get off the planet. If they as a people were against progressing, they would've destroyed whatever resources and technology they had – including the spacecraft that had brought them here. They still had weapons, coded doors and vehicles. But how would they have got here? How long had they been here? It was only recently that humanity as a species had progressed; they couldn't have been here any longer than thirty years. Something must have happened, _something_ that had poisoned their minds and corrupted whatever they had here.

The men eventually drew away. She gave it another five minutes and sank down onto the ground, breathing quickly. Despair began to settle down on her shoulders. There was nothing to eat in the cupboards. It looked like the place hadn't been touched in years, much like the old factory. She didn't move from behind the counter – just in case they were only down the road. Ahead of her was another battered door, presumably leading to a kitchen.

Creeping slowly along, treading on pieces of glass and broken concrete, Shepard found the kitchen was as small and modest as the previous room. It was also derelict, and provided no food. She slumped down against the metal cupboard, hearing a steady drip somewhere. Her eyes flickered, fatigue overcoming her. Perhaps it was time to rest for now and figure out a possible way for escape. There were very few options, if any, that were left in her mind.

* * *

Shepard had only managed two hours of sleep. In the third hour, it was still dark outside, and there was no sound of trucks moving outside. She drifted in and out of sleep for many hours, how many she did not know. She glanced at the wound on her arm, under her dirty bandages. It had begun to swell, and there was a yellow substance around the exits of the wound. Her heart sunk, seeing it had clearly been infected. She doubted they had the equipment and resources to cure her if she had blood poisoning. Shepard tried another two hours of sleep, and resorted to hiding in the nearest cupboard when she heard the patrol again.

She could no longer bear to sleep when she knew that escape _had_ to be possible. These people didn't have the resources to destroy or take apart a ship. There had to be one here, one that had brought most of them here in the first place. It seemed there were others who had rebelled, who were still in the process of rebelling. She was sat on top of the counter, thinking it through. She'd find a way to get back to the dig site, where she had seen two men a woman try to escape away. Perhaps there would be more people who knew of it there. But did she really want to return to gruelling labour with barely any rest and no food? If it was to get her off this planet, then so be it, she thought.

In all of a sudden, light filled the outer room of the café. Her hands shot up to cover her eyes. They must have activated the bright light that filled the dome. Shepard opened the door ever so slightly, looking to see if anyone was about. The light failed to catch on some aspects of the dusty, dirty interior of the café.

Her eyes flicked down to a large brown patch in the centre of the floor. _Old blood._ As Shepard scouted the outside for soldiers, trampling back over the broken glass, she could hear a muffled voice. Whipping her head back round, she detected it was coming from behind in the kitchen. Slowly but surely, she re-entered the kitchen, and closed the door behind her. Again, the voice began speaking. It was a familiar deep hoarse voice, but it was still muffled. Shepard quickly ran her hands over the various counters, trying to detect where it was coming from.

_It's a comm terminal. Where is it? Why does it sound so familiar? _

Just as she was about to give up, she soon felt a give in the metallic surface at the back of a cabinet. Her fingernails, which had grown slightly longer than she could bear, dug into the small crack around the give in the cabinet's surface. Pulling it out with some effort and a few grunts, she looked down into a small dug out pit. It smelt of plastic and concrete. Levering herself down into the hole feet first, Shepard saw the space was big enough for two people. Wires hung everywhere, catching in her hair. Taking precaution, she rose back up and lowered the hatch back down to cover the hole. It was at this point she was wished she still had her omni-tool. _Bastards. _

A single terminal on a large interface sat in front of her. A small yellow light bleeped, every ten seconds or so. The voice had now disappeared. Tapping the screen of the terminal provoked nothing. There was no keyboard and the wires around her didn't seem to be connected to anything. The interior looked as if it hadn't been dug out, but rather like it had been filled in. Soil and earth made up the wall around her. Shepard realised she was probably sat on more than just plain earth. Suddenly static began screeching from the terminal in front of her. She found a button at the side of the terminal – a manual emergency trigger in case the screen was not working. She spoke urgently into the intercom.

"Hello? Is anyone there?" The static for a few minutes kept screeching as she tried the intercom again. She hoped whoever was on the frequency could understand the English language. With her omni-tool gone, so was her galactic translator.

"I'm Commander Shepard of the Alliance, can you read me?"

Her voice was rasping from disuse and lack of water. The static abruptly stopped, leaving the small pit silent again. She could feel the sweat begin to roll down her back. The voice suddenly spoke, but halfway through a sentence. It was a familiar male voice. Her heart was in her mouth. She tried desperately again. There was no response, but the voice kept talking as if they hadn't heard her at all. Scraping away the mud and earth around the terminal, breaking a couple of fingernails in the process, she found a small volume switch. The voice was slightly louder, but not by much. It was all she needed. It was Garrus Vakarian.

* * *

Shepard began to shout down at the intercom, but Garrus did not pick up whatever she said. She couldn't believe it at first. Perhaps she was hallucinating, from the lack of food and water? It was impossible. She had seen the Normandy explode, and none of the escape pods had been ejected. Calming down, realising the intercom was broken, she began to listen to what he was saying.

"Log seventy-four," came his voice. "I've been evading them for months now, but I don't know how long it will last. The transponder keeps telling them I'm a Turian freighter bound for the ice rings of Nuala over in the Terminus System, but the stealth system is failing. Not as good as the Normandy's was. Ultimately they'll see it's a stolen Alliance Cruiser."

It was as if he was audio logging: Something that was personal and shouldn't be listened to by anyone else.

"She handles well, surprisingly enough. I've managed to upgrade a few things, but not as much as I liked, such as the cannons. I got a lot of upgrades off some Batarian seller in some random market. That's what I've been reduced to. Scrounging off some maniac in a seedy marketplace, on the fringes of the galaxy. Sometimes I like it, not like those regimented days back in C-Sec. Or those days under Shepard. The painful ones."

His voice cut out. She stared at the black terminal for a long time. It was beyond her belief that she would ever dream of hearing his voice again. He was alive. Which must mean he must've escaped, somehow, with others. But how? She saw the missile tear her ship apart. As far as she was concerned, he was dead and she was marooned on a tiny planet that no one knew about. His words were also perplexing to her: 'Painful days with her on the Normandy?' That was not how she would've described it. She remembered his elation when they found him on Omega. He always had her back, always accepted what she did, even if it was with Cerberus.

A frown enveloped on her face. Was it real? Or had that method of torture got to her? Shepard padded around the place a bit more, trying to find a way to fix the terminal. Without a doubt it was his voice. Why was he escaping on an Alliance cruiser, and using a transponder to cloak his identity? Stealing an Alliance cruiser was the kind of thing, if under serious attack, Garrus would resort to. Who was after him? She had pissed off the Illusive Man. Maybe he had sent Cerberus troops after them. Fatigue overcame her, and for a while she slept, curling up in the corner of the pit.

* * *

His voice woke her up again. She smiled at the remembrance as she listened to him. His dry sense of humour. His initial clumsiness as a result of trying to be funny when he realised he fancied her. She was flirtier than she thought was ever capable of being, prompting him. Perhaps it indicated just how much she liked him. They were also ridiculously similar; an aptitude for combat, disregard for the rules and both were pretty nifty with a sniper rifle.

"Log seventy-six. I sometimes think about her," he said, which drew her attention to his words, away from her memories. "A little formal and hurried when I first met her. A bit blunt, somewhat unsmiling too. Eager to get the job done – what I _really _liked about her. I began to genuinely admire her when she punched that reporter on the Citadel. I think that's when Wrex began to like her too. I'll never stop laughing when she made that Batarian bartender drink his own poisoned beverage. Dark then, hilarious now. Not that I'd do it differently. I do the exactly the same. She was different from other humans I'd met. Seemingly unconcerned with what she wanted. Until she realised me of course," he said, laughing a little. She smiled at the terminal.

"Sometimes in a certain light when she wasn't angered or determined I saw a rather exposed light in those brown eyes of hers. I wish I told her I loved her. A ridiculous thought. Perhaps I feel that because we were thrown together in extreme circumstances. I still don't know her first name. She completely changed after we got out of that mess with the destruction of the relay. A different person now. Although I don't remember much. But that was a long time ago. She turned out to be far different than I ever anticipated. A monster," he finished.

She sat there in the silence, staring at the terminal. Complete and utter perplexity washed over her in an instant. Surrounded by nothing but earth that blocked out any kind of sound from outside, caused her to hear the slight ringing in her ears and the beating of her heart. A monster? How on earth did he escape the destruction of the relay? If he had survived, then to him she would be dead, but he was talking as if she had betrayed him. Something smarted at her eyes a little.

Tears. They glistened over the fronts of her eyeballs, and before she could stop them, they slowly rolled down her dirty, sunken cheeks. Her body trembled beneath her, as she drew in a sharp breath. Pressing the heels of her hands into her eyes, she rubbed them fiercely until she made sure they were gone. _Don't. Focus. Any more and you'll be gone. _She didn't understand what had happened but the sorrow in Garrus's voice pained her to the point where she remembered what pain really felt like.


	7. The Other Shepard

She'd kept pain at bay for a long time. She accepted it, but it didn't disappear. As she lay there, hoping for Garrus's voice to return, the memories began to filter in.

It was the day her parents were killed. It had been one of those hot, humid days they often experienced. It was the third season. She'd heard the dog barking incessantly as she'd been sat on the tractor. She had to stop it, the engine still rumbling. It was an old thing, a model from the late 2150's, but her parents weren't as well off as some of the other families. These days she did a lot of the work driving the tractor along the crops. Her parents were getting old, her father nearing sixty with her mother close behind. Shepard had frowned as she saw the old girl barking and barking. She heard her mother's voice, calling her by her nickname.

_Rin! What's the matter with her? _She shouted over to her mother, pointing at their border collie. Her mother signalled for her to come in. Shepard, unsuspecting, hadn't bothered to park the tractor back inside their large barn and walked straight into the house, leaving it outside. The dog had disappeared. She hadn't heard what had happened to her mother, but she saw one batarian shoot her father through the jugular, just in the sitting room on her right. She hadn't time to think properly. Behind her, they set fire to the farm, and within minutes most of it was aflame. She had darted upstairs, heart in mouth, unable to believe her father was bleeding out downstairs.

One batarian spotted her attempting to climb out of the window upstairs. She scraped her shoulder on the window and grazed both knees when she jumped out, which was two feet below. She was sixteen and vulnerable. She'd been helping her mother cook a favourite recipe that morning. She ran through the tall crops, breathing and panting like she never had before. Everything was on fire. She saw a troop of them in a shuttle speed towards her on her right and she darted into the nearest house for cover. Everyone in that house was slaughtered as well. The single batarian still inside hit her round the head with a weapon she hadn't seen. Hot blood had run down her face and neck. She remembered thinking how fragile the human body was. She remembered thinking she had never seen a batarian before. Blood was all over her, and it was all over the floor from the massacre of the pervious inhabitants. She can still remember that particular smell; the mixture of blood and burnt crops.

The lone batarian struck her hard in the face, so she fell backwards against what was a stove, hitting her head on the metal. Her upper lip was cut. Purple spots danced in front of her eyes. On the colony not everyone was fitted with a transmitter so she hadn't a clue what he was saying. An explosion suddenly occurred outside, shaking the house. The Batarian ran off. She lifted herself up and all she did was run. Shepard had run like she had never done so before in her life, until her lungs ached, her calves burned. Her face was sticky with blood. And then, a ship. She reached out for the single human hand that unfolded in front of her. Her clothes were scorch-marked and bloody. She took one last look at what was her home, and climbed aboard. It turned out to be an Alliance patrol. She didn't remember much after that. She hadn't listened to them and sort of crumpled to the floor, gasping for air. She was probably crying, but it felt like suffocating.

* * *

When Shepard awoke again, she couldn't hear his voice. Dead silence surrounded her once more. Despite missing her omni-tool, she tried to fix the wires that were connected to the terminal. It took her a couple of hours to get through the earth encasing the technology. Pieces of dirt resided in-between the cracks of the large CPU. She felt the familiar pangs in her stomach twisting her gut as she tried to reconnect the various wires. Luckily, halfway through her digging she had found a loose metal plate, and began to use it instead. Her hands were caked in dirt, her fingernails broken. It was difficult to retain her pride. As she worked furiously to manually fix the terminal, Shepard began to feel dazed from her hunger. It would've been easier for her to re-enter the kitchen to find something more substantial to help her dig out the vast amount of earth. But she didn't want to take any chances with the brutal patrols out there.

If she didn't get through to someone soon, she was going to be in a lot of trouble. After her second respite, Shepard eventually found a small microphone after plenty of digging. Attaching it to the central CPU, she began to talk softly into it. For the first hour, she heard nothing. Desperation licked at her conscience. She began to feel a tingling sensation in the tips of her fingers, and in her toes. She activated the terminal and the screen miraculously flickered on. Her eyes quickly skimmed over the readings. Tapping the screen, she managed to obtain a code that had inexplicably been picked up, obviously locating Garrus's signal on the frequency. It seemed as if the terminal had been shut down due to disuse, rather than complete malfunction.

"Vakarian?" she tried, once more. Static came through instead, crackling loudly. She tried again, the sweat running down her temples.

"Hello? Can anyone read me?" Perhaps she hadn't connected the right wires, or set it up properly. After all there were no comm buoys nearby to support a network. So she wasn't entirely sure how she was even picking up a signal. It was inexplicable. The technology appeared simple, but unrecognisable. How long had it been here? It looked like years.

"Garrus Vakarian?" Shepard began again. It was useless. She wasn't sure how the tech worked, and even if she had fixed it, there was no possible way to communicate properly without a comm buoy. If a buoy had once existed, it would've been destroyed along with the Omega-4 Relay.

"Log eighty," came Garrus's voice, fairly louder than previously. Shepard recoiled from her seat, eyes wide. She tapped on the terminal's surface, activating the microphone once more.

"Garrus?" she said.

"Who is this!" he suddenly demanded. Her fingers trembled, hovering over the terminal's screen. "How the hell are you getting through my comm system?" His antagonistic tone of voice was unfamiliar.

"It's Commander Shepard," she answered immediately. There was a short, stunned silence. She could hear the slight static fizzing in the background.

"Do you know my coordinates? You're not getting to me this time, Shepard. You've managed to control everything else. You're _not _getting me," he snapped. Dumbfounded, Shepard stared at the screen for several moments. _What? _

"Listen to me, Garrus! What are you talking about? It's Commander Shepard; I've been marooned on a dwarf planet-" His voice cut through hers harshly. This wasn't the Garrus she knew.

"Don't try to feed me your indoctrinating jargon! I can see straight through a human, both in appearance and in voice. Wherever you are, I'm ten steps ahead of you. Breaking the rules was always my kind of thing," he spat. She lost her patience completely.

"Shut-up you asshole!" she shouted. Her yell had crackled the frequency slightly. There was a longer silence this time. Her heart was thumping beneath her dirtied tunic.

"My, I'm impressed. Is this what ruling the galaxy has reduced you to?" he goaded her. He was making no sense. Ruling the galaxy? It was as if he was speaking to someone else, not her. What the hell happened in the last month since she was stranded here? What would get him to listen to her, seeing as he was not doing so at all?

"It's Kathryn!" she burst out. Would he listen, she wondered. Hardly anyone else knew her forename. She wasn't sure why and where, but she was determined to find out. She was determined to get off this miserable planet.

"What?" he responded. For the first time, she caught him off guard.

"My first name is Kathryn," she said, her voice laced with desperation.

"Emotional tactics now? Nice. All that time I thought you ran the absolute gamut of callousness," he provoked her, once more.

"What the _hell_ are you on about?" she spat aggressively. "Please, listen to me-"

The terminal's frequency cut off. She was left with nothing but silence. Shepard sat there looking at it for a long time. Eventually, she curled up and fell asleep.

* * *

It was a day later. With barely any energy, she sat upright and furiously began to work at the terminal. Shepard had heard his audio log once more, but he spoke nothing of their meeting. She decided to try a different tactic this time. After about an hour, she managed to find out how to record an audio log, hoping he would be able to pick it up. On the screen in front of her, she had his code in her wavelength. Hopefully he would be able to pick her up again. Leaning forward to speak into the microphone, she could not keep the tremble out of her voice.

"Day twenty-seven," she began, mimicking him. Her voice sounded deeper than usual. "Logging in as K.S Shepard. I'm imprisoned on a biological human-owned dome in an unchartered dwarf planet that has been named Aegeus. Year 2185. The _Normandy SR-2_ was destroyed along with the shuttle _UT-47 Kodiak_. The humans here are an organisation that is trying to indoctrinate the inhabitants about the dangers of technology. I haven't eaten in days. They've removed my implant for my omni-tool and tortured me. My arm is infected. I'm currently hiding out in an abandoned, undisclosed communications chamber. If anyone is picking this message up, I'm transferring the coordinates now."

By the time she had finished, the computer in front of her had transferred the coordinates. Frowning, she stared at it for some time. Garrus didn't reply for a few hours. On the third hour, her hunger started to gnaw at her so intensely; she began to curl on the ground in pain. _You have to go outside. Find something. Anything. _Instead, her eyes slowly closed from fatigue. _Shepard. Get up. Get up, marine! _

Shepard wasn't sure where she was several hours later. She had been dreaming, quite vividly, about being stuck inside a vehicle under water. She knew if she sank further it would be harder to escape. Taking a deep breath, Shepard pulled open the door. The water flooded in.

"Shepard? If this is a new tactic then I have to say it's a very good one." Startled out of sleep, Shepard flung herself upwards, heaving madly. Her arms flailed briefly in front of her as she tapped the terminal's screen. Had she briefly lost her breath while sleeping?

"Garrus," she said, still heavily breathing. "I'm patching you through some coordinates, if I can. _Please._ I'm imprisoned here. They are probably looking for me. I've been stuck here for nearly a month." She wasn't sure if she could bear his uncompromising tirade again, accusing her of something she had no idea about.

"How can I possibly believe you, whoever you are?" came his maddened voice again. "You're talking in the past tense." Shepard frowned at the terminal in front of her.

"I seriously don't follow. Please just-"

"The year is 2200," was Garrus's reply.

Shepard felt herself turn white with shock. None of what Garrus had said so far had made any sense. She felt if she tried to get him to explain, it wouldn't end well. He was certainly incensed about something. _What the hell had happened?_ She was silent for several moments, listening to the quietened static in the background, but immediately spoke again for fear of losing his signal.

"What?" Shepard murmured. "I've only been here for a _month. _How can I possibly be talking to someone in the future?" Her voice had continued to rise with each word. She was becoming very irritated now. Perhaps it was time she began her tirade of accusations. It was becoming unbearable stuck down in this earthy pit, starving, dirty with no possible way out. Whatever she had expected him to say she let fall between them.

"I'm scanning your signal," Garrus replied nonchalantly. "Very old system you're using… You can't be Shepard," he stated like it was a well-known fact. Her fists curled up beneath her as she stared furiously at the screen.

"_Shepard_ is currently on the Citadel, her throne. She's merged half the galaxy with synthetics. It's still happening. The only part of the galaxy left is the Terminus System. Still under Reaper control, just not merged," he spoke with scarcely checked disgust. Was this Cerberus, using Garrus as a way to get to her? Or was it the humans on this planet? Had they succeeded in brainwashing her to the point where she was hallucinating? But she didn't believe them, she knew she was stronger than that.

"I…I don't understand. How?" Shepard murmured.

"Well, if you are Shepard, _Kathryn_ Shepard as you claim to be, you must be _clearly_ familiar with the story. After the Normandy returned to the Citadel, miraculously after that Omega-4 relay was destroyed, you apparently kicked every non-human off the ship and pissed back off," he said. There was evident disdain and sarcasm in his voice that pained her.

"Not back to Earth as the Alliance wanted, you severed all ties with them. Several months passed, we're all up to our necks in Reapers, and you, persuaded by that oh so lovely Illusive Man, the charming Brooks and a few other trigger-happy humans, decide to take control of the Reapers and _then_ merge all organic and synthetic life together. So you became the Catalyst, and employed those other humans as your seconds-in-command. You kicked off your Alliance boots, or Cerberus boots, or whatever, set back and had a large cocktail after that. Probably been sitting there on your-"

"Ok, that's enough with the sarcastic bullcrap, Vakarian," she snapped. "You've always known that every step I dared to take was to defeat the Reapers. I wasn't going to let anyone 'persuade' me otherwise. I saw the _Normandy_ destroyed! Just under a month ago. I presumed everyone was dead. Please tell me you know me better than what you're accusing."

"_Accusing_!?" he responded. His voice was so loud the sound crackled slightly. "It's the truth! We all thought you were indoctrinated for ages. And when plucky Liara, who was your best friend by the way, pinned you physically to the ground and Chakwas ran a diagnostic over your body, you carried no symptoms or otherwise of indoctrination. That was before you merged everything. You'd become everything you hated. And you know what? I despise you for ruining everything you stood for. I thought you were always one to stand by your principles, even if you did it in a blunt fashion. You were no paragon of virtue. But you were a tough warrior with a heart. I'm a decided wanted criminal because of you. And there are others who escaped. I'm an idiot for telling you, but I want you to know that they're not under your control. Vakarian out."

His voice cut out. The pit stunk. She stunk. Her mind rang with old spoken words and old memories, long gone. This was a turian who might've loved her. Who was she kidding? They never had a relationship. She let the silence hum around her for a long time, her stomach an abandoned cavern, her arm a source of continuous burning.


	8. The Truth

Garrus had completely cut his contact, and all Shepard could hear now was the tuneless static of the comm system. For several hours, she lay there, listening to the static of the terminal, feeling strangely comforted by it. It reminded her life was still out there. That she could still get off this planet, no matter how long it took. Question was, how would she find sufficient food and water? It wasn't just Garrus's utterly perplexing words that stunned her. It was also his barefaced hostility. She couldn't think of what the possible situation was. _Another Shepard? An alternate future? By fifteen years?_

None of it made sense, none of it plausible or even scientific. Someone out there was somehow trying to kill her, trying to stop her from leaving this planet. Somehow trick her into an implausible story by using Garrus as bait. She had to admit the story was extremely intricate, which made her hesitate to think anyone would do such a thing. Her love life had never been successful before, what made her think it would be any better with a Turian? She hadn't much luck with Kaidan, who had been attracted to her from the beginning. Professed love had turned into anger at her working alongside Cerberus. And the fact she hadn't contacted him for two years, which she hadn't much say in. _I'm an Alliance soldier, and always will be. _Well, so am I, she had thought angrily. _Who are you to judge me? _She was convinced it wasn't love. It hadn't been on her part. Maybe it was the same with Garrus.

"Commander Shepard?" came a voice seemingly out of nowhere. Shepard was curled on the earthy floor, barely listening to the static anymore. The hunger and thirst had completely drained her. She wasn't sure how much longer this could go on. More than anything, the abhorrence in Garrus's voice had pained her beyond description. _Don't go down this route, _a quiet voice inside her head told her. She lifted up a dirty arm, blindly tapping the terminal above her.

"Yes?" she barely spoke, shaking.

"Commander Shepard. I've been running a diagnostic on your coordinates. You are using an old system, but I have hacked into the private data that came through with your transmission."

Shepard could barely register the familiar voice, due to astonishment. Heaving herself upwards with everything she had left, she tapped the screen frantically in front of her. It was Edi's voice. Pure relief enveloped her senses. Out of all the possible voices that could come through the transmission, Edi's gave her the greatest respite.

"Edi!" she croaked. "I saw the _Normandy_ go down?! How did you find me? Tell me what the hell is going on! I've been speaking with Garrus. I didn't believe anything he was saying, please tell me you're not from fifteen years in the future?" Despite her pain and exhaustion, Shepard could not stop her hasty flow of words.

"Yes, Commander, the year is currently 2200 CE. I have avoided detection for years. However I have a theory on why time has been displaced between you and I," Edi replied. For a long time she had distrusted Edi, not because she was an AI, but because she was installed by Cerberus, and had several blocks barring her from any further information. Whatever was done on board the Normandy, Edi had the Illusive Man to answer to, to feed him information.

"I saw the _Normandy_ destroyed not long after we landed on this dwarf planet. Then my shuttle was destroyed too. I've believed for the past month everyone was dead. I got through to Garrus using this comm system, but whatever told me was…He…didn't make sense," said Shepard. She was breathless with anticipation.

"Technically we are in the same places. If it were not for the particular comm system you are using, it wouldn't be possible to correspond. Which is why I hacked into the private data. It is a certain type of comm system that uses a surpassing link that transcends a time period. It does not use buoys. I have mapped your coordinates. You are on an uncharted dwarf planet. Time is severely displaced because you are affected by the galaxy's core - in which resides a supermassive black hole - resulting in a gravitational time dilation. If my calculations are correct, seven days on this dwarf planet is the equivalent of five years on Earth," said the AI without pausing for breath.

Shepard stared blankly at the running numbers on the terminal in front of her. Her heart sank, all the way to the pit of her stomach. Christ. She was too late.

"Edi, before I even _begin_ to comprehend such a thing…can you give me a current status of where you are? Garrus was talking about me in a way I couldn't understand," Shepard answered. She wasn't ready to hear what was about to come next.

"I have upgraded my systems intensively over the last six years. I am now an unshackled AI. The _Normandy_ was not destroyed fifteen years ago, although to you it appeared so. It was staged. Only I have recollection of what happened to the ship. It was targeted and caught in a transcoding beam by another ship, operating under an extremely advanced stealth system. The crew were gassed to the point where none of them, to this day, remember what happened. This specific ship had an advanced FTL core, so it took mere weeks to reach the next system, and to the nearest relay. It had been built by Cerberus, it is called the _Erebus_. Shepard, and ex-Cerberus agent Maya Brooks, was on board once the crew woke up from long-haul sedation. Shepard docked the Normandy at the Citadel, and had every single member removed. Both she and Brooks had pro-Cerberus views, and it was not difficult to gain new crewmembers," said Edi.

There was a brief silence. The air inside the earthy pit hummed somewhat. What Shepard? Who was this? Or what? Had Cerberus created an unshackled AI designed to look like her?

"Another Shepard?" she barely whispered. "Time dilation? Please explain, Edi."

"Of course. It is a difference of elapsed time between two events, situated at varying distances from a gravitating mass. Because you are close to the black hole, it has a much stronger gravitational potential. So the closer the clock is to the source of gravitation, the slower time passes in relation, for example to Earth's," responded the AI. Shepard had understood before Edi had explained it in detail, but she didn't want to believe the truth. Everything was ruined. Half the galaxy controlled and merged with synthetics? It was a nightmare. The only positive outcome of this was that the Reapers had not harvested. Her mind was racing at a thousand miles a minute. A new surge of energy had overcome her.

"Edi, what do you know about this Shepard? Is it an unshackled AI in some new body designed to look like me? And the Reapers? They were on the cusp of invading after we defeated the Collectors. What about the Council? And you? What's your story?" If Edi were capable of smiling, she would've done. The Commander she knew certainly hadn't changed, even after what she had been through. She was always one for questions. Hundreds of them.

"I will answer the latter first, if you'll let me, Commander," she answered. "When we were headed back to the Citadel, I tried to block the Illusive Man's technicians from attempting to track the ship. However Brooks me up picked on this and overrode my systems, briefly shutting me down. When Brooks was introduced to the crew, and with the general behaviour of the Commander, I knew something was amiss. I ran a brief diagnostic on the Commander's body, but I did not detect any difference. The body was exactly as it was."

"How did I act differently?' Shepard asked.

"Although you were exactly the same physically, your ideas were wholly different. It seemed within overnight you had become xenophobic. You had all the other crew members who were not human removed-"

"And Garrus?" Edi was silent for a moment.

"You had him removed, like everyone else. Nothing else. You cut off the connection." Shepard was well aware Edi kept something from her, but for some reason she refrained from pushing the AI. Sometimes things were best kept unknown.

"I knew your best relationships were with other species," Edi continued. "You didn't show any concern for your crew, when I knew your loyalty had been strong. You wanted to operate alone. You hired human mercenaries named CAT6, and did not return to Earth, ignoring the Alliance's request. I pretended to be a simple VI, once Brooks brought me back online. Cerberus took control of a Prothean dig site on Mars very shortly after the docking at the Citadel. However, it was not long before the Alliance came looking for Shepard. The Alliance forces were strong, and many Cerberus troops were killed, including Dr. Eva Core, a synthetic. They brought her back on the Normandy, presumably to repair her, but I managed to subdue her and simulate my system into her body. It caused ship-wide fluctuations, including a fire in the AI core. It was not a seamless transition."

"And this other Shepard?" she asked. It was the question she was keener to have answered than anything else.

"Several years ago as you were being revived, Cerberus created a clone of you to provide spare limbs and organs. Brooks had escaped with your tank before the clone was terminated, two months before the suicide mission," Edi replied without effort. It was easier for this information to sink in than everything else.

"Clone Shepard no longer exists physically. She exists only as a digital copy in the form of the Catalyst. The Catalyst is the Reaper's master AI, residing on the Citadel," answered Edi. This time, Shepard could not find the right words to reply. She had been stunned into silence, and for the first time was unaware of her aching body, her gnawing hunger, and the slow steady throb in her arm. There was one last question, despite her bewilderment.

"When the Omega-4 Relay was destroyed, it would've wiped out anything within the vicinity. How did this dwarf planet survive the impact?" she said.

"That I cannot answer, Shepard. I haven't enough data on the planet itself to discern why it avoided annihilation. It would have taken an extremely powerful kinetic barrier to protect it from the Relay's destruction. Even then, it is not entirely possible to do so. Not yet."

Shepard frowned, confounded. It was another unsolvable mystery that made no sense to her whatsoever. A month or so back, she had inadvertently destroyed a Batarian system to prevent an imminent Reaper invasion by destroying the Alpha Relay. She was silent for more than a minute, lost in her own thoughts.

"Shepard, if you're still there, I am in the process of formulating a strategy, but it will be difficult to do so without furthering time. I am also unaware if another relay has been built. I have Garrus's codes to transfer across. I can try to set up a video comm link," she said, drawing Shepard out of her daze.

"It won't convince him," she replied. Edi was quiet for several moments, and briefly Shepard thought the AI had disconnected, leaving only static for her to listen to. The screen in front of her flickered several times in all of a sudden. Shepard was left staring at it in horror, wondering if Edi had ignored her and connected Garrus anyway.

"Edi, don't do it," she ordered, her voice harsh. Edi had apparently ignored her. The screen, for the first time, changed. It crackled a little. She hesitated for a little bit, angered by Edi's tenacity. She wasn't sure whether she wanted to look at the Turian she'd come to love, who had fed her nothing but disdain since she first got through a communications systems. Breathing in a long slow breath, she had to admit this was one of the hardest things she had ever done in her life. The crackly image flickered up on the screen in front of her. She saw Garrus's face, clear cut and un-obscured, with the same old scars. His mandibles were taut in anticipation, or animosity. He wore light brown camouflage armour, outlined in black. His beady blue eyes pierced through her very being, as none other had done.

To him, she still wasn't his.

The Shepard he knew was not how he remembered her. He felt confused, her body no longer _existed_. She was the Catalyst, a row of glowing tubes and a cybernetic outer layer. Nothing of her humanity left, as she controlled the Reapers. But this woman on his screen was not Shepard either. This Shepard was thinner. Much, much thinner. Her cheeks had sunken in slightly. Her round eyes popped, more than usual. Her very dark hair had grown, so it touched her shoulders. She had a cut on her lower lip, and there were dirty smudges on her cheeks and on the tip of her nose. No cybernetic outer layer. No tubes. She still bore several scars from the Lazarus project. _You can't be her. _A terrible, tremulous ache rippled up from his gut to his sternum. He'd never seen her helpless like this before. She'd always been a strong warrior in his eyes.

"You're not…" he barely murmured.

"Fuck!" He heard her groan in response. He quickly glanced back at her on the screen. Her head was in her hands. He stared at her long fingers clutched in her hair, squeezing and un-squeezing. The knuckles were white and nearly bursting out of the skin. Her hands too were dirty, with blackened fingernails. It appeared as if she had been digging with her fingernails. He saw some dried blood on her arm, which housed her omni-tool. Surely…He glanced away for a bit, and then looked back to his screen. Commander Shepard. Gaunt, barely skin over bone and filthy. She was completely unrecognisable. Far from the Commander he'd once known, and the ruthless tyrant she was now. He couldn't say anything, couldn't find the words to speak. It had been too long. She finally glanced upwards. Her eyes were like wet pebbles, hard and glassy-looking.

"Edi, please cut off comm. Let me know when you're touching base. Patch through your coordinates." _Interrupt her. Tell her. Say something. Anything. _

He didn't. it was too late. Her face disappeared, and the screen fuzzed over. He watched the black and white screen, flicking over and over. He then convinced himself it was a plot, a disgusting manoeuvre plotted by Shepard's cronies to get to him. Had they found him? Garrus cut off all communication with Edi. It had been fifteen years since he had last spoken to the AI, but he didn't trust her now. Shepard must have control over something like Edi. The comm in front of Shepard back in her earth-pit cut out and buzzed loudly.

* * *

All communication between Edi and Shepard had been cut out. She wasn't sure how it had happened, but she was sure that the violent disruption created by Garrus by cutting the transmission had something to do with it. Shepard didn't resort to curling on the floor, giving in to the violent pain that wracked her body, originating from her abdomen that rocketed to her head and back. Death seemed like it was embedded into every crevice of the ditch that faced her, as she sat there, powerless and fucked off with the entire situation. She felt like punching the terminal's screen in front of her, hack it to pieces with her white-knuckled hand until it was a bloody pulp.

She couldn't afford to be an idiot, but at least it would release the pent-up frustration and desolation that crept upon her like a dark haze. To mistrust Garrus's words was easy enough; but to do the same with Edi was unthinkable. Yet the situation was plausible, and it wouldn't have even occurred to her. It was unlikely Edi was going to be able to contact her now. Isolated, with not a friend in the world to help her. If what Edi had told her were true, and if she did return, she would be reviled. Clone Shepard had made sure of that. She never had many friends anyway. Nothing but silence filled the pit, not even static emitted from the technology in front of her.

She was running out of ideas and feasible amounts of food. All she had been able to find were nothing but scraps, and it had her gagging in any case. It would either mean waiting on Edi, finding a way to contact the AI again, or going back outside. _Go with the initial plan. _Instead, she found herself repeatedly punching the terminal's screen. It felt somewhat rewarding to feel an intense pain fire through her hand, her knuckles tingling. It wasn't long before her hand went straight through the middle of the screen, giving way completely. Underneath the screen was completely hollow. She couldn't feel further earth and dirt beneath her. Frowning, Shepard quickly pulled out her filthy arm. Peering into the vast hole beneath her, she saw an even larger pit. She sat there for several moments, aghast. Another hideout? She didn't hesitate, even if the area beneath her could potentially dangerous.

Despite wearing thin canvas shoes and having little strength she shoved her feet through the screen again. The terminal shook briefly and completely collapsed, falling deeper into the pit below. Satisfied, Shepard clutched the edges of the broken CPU's outer cabinet that housed the terminal and pushed herself below, into the unknown. She fell about a metre, barely breaking her fall, which had taken her by surprise. The smell in this new pit smelt strange and inhuman. _I hope to Christ there's something good in here. _


	9. An Alien Encounter

The alien-like cave that Commander Shepard had found herself in smelt of damp, age-old soil as she padded around in the darkness. The sound here was muffled, if she coughed or sniffed the sound barely travelled. She was surprised it was breathable in this cave and momentarily cursed herself for assuming it was. She could make out a bluish light at the end of this cave, which she grimly regarded as emblematic. It was difficult to feel her way through the darkness, but the close earthy walls around her gave her guidance. The walls around soon expanded as she deepened further into the vast tunnel. Hundreds of years of gnarled rock surrounded her, cutting through the damp soil that eventually disappeared as she ventured further. Her breathing was shallow, the air felt limited.

After half an hour or so, she began to see huge stalagmites rise up from the uneven ground, jagged in their masses, like knives plunging into the ceiling of the cave. She saw a wet, shiny slime that covered the brown-grey walls, glittering as she walked past. Shepard felt a primeval fear encase her as she slowly edged through the stalagmites. Her feet had caught once or twice on hard rock, the canvas shoes wearing away already from the ancient, unyielding rock. Instinct told her that something inhuman was down here, and for once she welcomed it. Undoubtedly, as the light gave way, the formation of the cave was beautiful.

Shepard rounded a corner when she reached the bluish light, a tiny hue that only bounced off the shiny rocky walls. Out of nowhere, a thought came to her: Wyers' audio log back in the abandoned Alliance unit. He had spoken of an alien artefact that resided here, according to their scanners. Pushing this thought aside for a moment, Shepard saw a steep gully as the walls sharply narrowed in. Kneeling down, she pushed herself down the steep ditch, inevitably catching her feet on the way down. Shepard wasn't sure how far below the surface she was now, but she took an educated guess of about a thousand metres or so. She could vaguely make out long, rectangular shapes that extended nearly two metres, and sixty centimetres apart. It was difficult to see in the damp cavern, and only a peculiar dull glow came from an unspecified corner. Feeling the sweat run in rivets down her face and back, she moved towards the greenish hue glowing on and off.

It was a small unit, although she couldn't make out much more than that in the limited light. Bringing herself closer, she could make out strange initials on the side, although she could not understand them. Whatever was encased in the small container behind her, she was taking a risk in opening them. But desperation drove her on. It was worth the risk, she thought. Feeling around the rectangular chamber that sat on the ground, she finally came across a panel, reading an unfamiliar language. It looked like life readings to her. Selecting a random panel, the readings grew in number, as a white light to the left of her started radiating a red beam that lit up her entire face. The unit behind began to whir. _Shit. _

Standing up, Shepard slowly backed away, keeping her eyes on the coffin-like container. It suddenly began to dawn on her that what was in front was essentially a cryo-unit. And whatever inside might be hostile and unknown to her. Steam was ejected from the sides of the container. Shepard watched, her body tense and ready. The lid slowly slid off, but only halfway, so she could barely see who or what was inside. She did not recognise the outline of the head, however.

For a moment, nothing happened, and all Shepard could hear was the continual whur of the machine unit behind her. A bipedal body heaved itself out of the container, falling immediately onto the ground below it. Slowly the figure moved upwards and turned to face her after composing itself. It was dressed in striking white reflective armour, although she couldn't tell much more from that. It began talking to her, but without her omni-tool or a terminal she had no idea what it was saying. In front of her, the face of the alien was brought into the occasional glow from the container's white light as it grabbed her shoulder. Two sets of yellow eyes sat on either side of a triangular-shaped head, the front eyes larger than the back. Like a lot of species she knew within the galaxy, the hand that sat on her bony shoulder had three fingers. The alien's large brow somewhat obscured its line of sight, as it bent its head forward.

"Human…female," it spoke, correcting itself. "Evolved greatly." Silence ensued for a few minutes.

"How?" she replied, aghast.

"A sensory ability. I have read your physiology, your nervous system and your language," it spoke again, its voice low, although it sounded neutral as opposed to hostile.

"And you?" she asked.

"What year is it?" the alien demanded, ignoring her question. She noticed it still left a steady hand on her shoulder.

"It's debatable," Shepard answered. The tendons in her neck stuck out in fear, but her face appeared impassive. For the first time, she saw what looked like confusion in the alien's piercing eyes.

"I am prothean," it finally replied. It let go of her shoulder. Shepard's eyes widened, but she did not move an inch.

"The protheans were wiped out by the Reapers fifty thousand years ago," she replied, stunned. The prothean in front of her stepped further back, thinking deeply, as it's eyes rolled towards the gravel on the ground in contemplation. Shepard wasn't sure if she had the strength to interrupt the ancient creature's thoughts, as it continued to stand there very still.

"I'm-" she began, somewhat desperately. The Prothean slammed a hand back down on her shoulder, jolting her stance. She nearly buckled under the weight.

"Commander K.S Shepard of the Normandy SR-2, Alliance Marine, born human colony Mindoir.…" The prothean looked into her eyes, deciding whether such words had an impact on her. Seeing it didn't, the prothean loosened its grip on her shoulder once more and stood back to gaze at her properly.

"My ship was destroyed by an unknown force. As far as I know, I am the only survivor," she told the Prothean who gazed at her very steadily. She couldn't help but look towards the other large containers, five in total. Five ancient protheans. For once, the questions she usually asked seemed to stay on her tongue. The gaze from the prothean unnerved her, despite the fact she had been somewhat experienced in meeting the gaze of an alien. She knew for sure that the batarians deemed anyone who had less than four eyes unintelligent, and she knew that a fair few of them liked to unnerve humans by this fact.

"We were based here as a research unit," began the prothean, snapping her out of it. The prothean, whom she was unsure of its sex, walked away from her, pacing as it spoke. She took a guess - perhaps male.

"A thousand members of us were stationed here, some of us to research. Despite the lack of atmosphere and vegetation, the planet housed great quantities of useful minerals, such as palladium. We set up a small colony, deep beneath the surface of the planet," the prothean explained. Shepard still watched him with steady eyes, although it felt more and more difficult to continue standing.

"How did you arrive here? The Omega-4 relay led directly to the galaxy's core," she suddenly said. Half a dozen questions began to form on the tip of her tongue. The Prothean was still pacing, and did not look back at her when she had spoken.

"We had acquired a Reaper IFF," he replied. Back and forth he went, his large unclothed feet crunching on the gravel below, echoing around the cavern. "Our civilisation was already at war with the Reapers when we set up base on this dwarf planet. We intended more than just research. We built communication systems that transcended time without the need for comm buoys. We built an intricate network deep below the surface of this planet, in the hope we could reside secretly while researching the Reapers and to find a way to destroy them. This underground network was initially built as part of the colony. Our particular force surprised the single reaper that had come to wipe us out – Prodigy it was named. We had nearly defeated it when the last tactic it used was to set down a huge transponder into the surface. It destroyed the Omega 4 Relay and left. A thousand members in our force, every one, except for five of us including were indoctrinated. The Reapers then returned and harvested them."

It occurred to her that the communication terminal she had used earlier had been prothean, indicating she had been able to understand Garrus despite the fact she had no omni-tool. The prothean, tall and proud, had stopped erratically pacing, setting all four of it's piercing eyes on Shepard. Her knees wobbled, and she broke eye contact with the Prothean, self-consciously putting a hand on the clammy wall. It was difficult to take in this much information in her current standing; especially in the presence of a being that was essentially fifty thousand years old. He continued as if he hadn't noticed her lack of strength.

"Our secret was linked in our underground network. A spacecraft, built to propel forward enough to get to the next system, after the relay was destroyed," he spoke.

"Why would they destroy the relay? What was the point?" Shepard managed, her vision beginning to waver.

"They didn't want us to escape. Indoctrinate us yes, as a last resort, but even indoctrinated we proved unpredictable. Destroying the relay would give them time while they focused on harvesting the rest of us and other civilisations…" The prothean studied her for a brief minute.

"You humans…At the time we were being destroyed, you were only beginning modern civilisation…still on one continent. Look at you _now_." Anyone could have misinterpreted these words as condescending, but somehow she didn't believe they were. Her hand began slipping on the wall. Her consciousness felt like it was wavering. The prothean began to pace again. Cold sweat dribbled off her forehead, down into her eyes.

"Your situation?" he asked her. Shepard suddenly fell facedown onto the gravelly ground, hitting her head hard. The prothean wasted no time in helping her back up, sitting her against the wall, pressing a single digit onto her clammy neck. His finger was surprisingly warm, for a being that appeared somewhat reptilian and therefore cold-blooded. She recoiled slightly, for the prothean was a little too close for comfort, considering she'd never met one before.

"Your heart rate and breathing are elevated and your temperature is high for a human," he said. "Have you been wounded?" She raised her left arm shakily. Whatever makeshift bandage she had wrapped around her forearm had been soaked in blood and consequently dried. With no water, she had been unable to clean it. He took her arm and peeled the bandage from her arm, looking at the badly infected wound.

"You are suffering from sepsis," he concluded. "If you are not taken to a medical facility soon your condition will deteriorate-"

"Well it's a little late for that, isn't it?" Shepard snapped, with barely contained patience. It was the last thing she wanted to hear, and yet she had suspected it all along. It was one of the things they had been taught about in her basic military training, such a condition could develop in extreme circumstances without the immediate use of medi gel. The prothean ignored her response. He stood back up, and walked surprisingly calmly over to the small unit that housed the controls for the cryo-containers. He took out a small shot-device that housed medi-gel, presumably.

"We have antibiotics deeper within the system underground. Although I do not know how intact it will have stayed over time. For now…" He walked back over to her and pressed it into her left arm before she could protest. There was a brief sharp sting.

"What good is that going to do if it's fifty thousand years old?" she stated. The Prothean stood back up, putting the device back into a small crate inside the unit.

"For a military commander you are surprisingly insubordinate with your causticity," he replied. She gave him a firm frown, feeling immediately better, as she stood back up.

"I'm just pissed off," was all she could reply. If she could feel embarrassed, she would, seeing she was the first human he had met. For now, the Commander was desperate to get off the planet. Shepard decided that telling this prothean the whole story was perhaps the only way she could make that want happen. He was waiting as if he expected such an explanation.

"There is a small human colony that is set up here. They have a small city built in a bio-dome. How they maintain power and grow food is behind my comprehension. How long they have been here, I'm not entirely sure. I have a suspicion they have been here for the last thirty years, although…considering how you want to put it, it's probably longer from an Earth perspective…" She trailed off.

The prothean blinked. She tried not to think about the fact that last time she spoke to Garrus and Edi, they had both confirmed the current year back on Earth was 2200. That everything was lost, her clone controlled the Reapers, and half the galaxy had been merged with synthetic technology.

"Commander?"

"These people were…for want of a better word, strange. Organised, but believed in a society without technology, worshiped a higher deity although I don't know the specifics. They had soldiers patrol their streets and killed anyone who disobeyed. Drones that watched over workers who were forced to work without food or water for hours on end, killing them if they so much as spoke," she explained.

"These humans…most likely the transponder is still embedded within the planet," began the prothean. "It might explain their odd behaviour. They will have become indoctrinated from it, but the influence will not be as great as it was. But I can surmise that is why they worship some mysterious deity yet are against the advancement of technology, which advances a civilisation." Shepard stared at him for a moment, realising he was entirely right. Silence encased them for several minutes, and she was briefly aware of her pounding heart. It was a long story to explain about the Reapers. To her, they were still in 2185.

"The Reapers…My crew had been stranded after the Omega-4 Relay was destroyed by an unknown force. We had destroyed a base that sent out modified protheans, known as collectors who were stockpiling humans and using them to create a Reaper. It was near the galaxy's core. It was called a suicide mission. No one had survived travelling through that relay because they were plunged into the galaxy's core. We had little fuel, knowing it would take weeks to travel to the nearest relay, perhaps months. We were forced to land on this planet. I went down with a small crew on a shuttle, but minutes after our arrival my ship and shuttle were destroyed, along with, as I thought, all my crewmembers," she explained. The prothean appeared to be deep in thought, a signal for her to continue.

"I found an abandoned Alliance base, around twenty five years old, with a recording on a terminal. The expedition was secret, according to the log of the officer; they were searching for an artefact. Probably prothean," Shepard suggested. The prothean fixed her with a steady gaze, drawn out of his reverie.

"Knowledge, even concealed or forbidden, always finds a way, even if it has been distorted by thousands of years," he said.

"It doesn't explain why there are hundreds of people living under that bio-dome. Or how they built the dome in the first place," Shepard said.

"You said no one has ever survived the journey through the Omega 4 Mass Relay. No one knows because no one has ever lived to tell the tale. We had built the bio-dome ourselves, although most of us operated underground. Perhaps they improved the facilities inside," he explained. "Indoctrinated as they are, we are just as susceptible to it also. This planet is affected by gravitational time dilation. So while it has been years for your planet, to those humans it has only been several months, maybe a year."

He seemed to have discerned what was on her mind.

"The spacecraft has not yet been tested," he stated, gazing at her. She turned away from him, her arms crossed, thinking deeply. She thought about the other protheans, encased in their cryo-containers. She thought about the untested craft, stored for fifty thousand years under the surface of this dwarf planet. She also thought about the lack of time they had, give it any more, and shortly another fifteen years would have passed. Shepard turned back to face the prothean.

"I have to get off this planet. I can't waste any more time," was all she said for the moment. The prothean stepped towards her, his thoughtful stance now had become seemingly threatening.

"The galaxy is changed beyond repair, Commander. What makes you think that ordering me to set up a spacecraft that is potentially dangerous will change such a thing? Time is beyond your control!" he snapped.

"And what do you want to do, prothean? Stay here and rot? If I don't get out there now-"

"What about my people, Commander? And the humans above us?" he countered calmly.

"The humans above us? I could go round the whole galaxy saving small colonies until I die!" she almost shouted. There was a short silence. Her mind was frantically racing. If she guessed right, there was a weapons locker inside the unit that housed the cryo-containers controls. There was a further alley down beyond this small chamber, where she presumed was their small colony, although she did not know how big it was. She hadn't the faintest idea how to pilot a ship either and an alien ship at that. However, if she didn't get her way, she would just have to find out. The prothean seemed to detect what she was thinking again, which greatly exasperated her.

"You are not thinking straight, Commander. I advise that thwarting me is foolish. How do you propose to exit? Not many Commanders in your Alliance know how to pilot ships, do they?" His voice had remained infuriatingly soft and quiet. Her hands were itching, and she was beginning to forget her pain and lethargy, now replaced by adrenaline.

"How would you know?" she sneered at him. _What are you doing? _The prothean, if surprised, showed no sign of it, as he continued to stand calmly in front of her. Perhaps she ought to give him an explanation.

"Some of my crew are still alive. I accessed one of your comm terminals that allowed me to communicate with some of them. It picked up their transmissions on separate ships. I found out how much time had passed…" She paused, looking at the prothean steadily. He barely blinked. "I had…The Collectors two years ago, in my time, had destroyed my ship. I was spaced. A black ops human group named Cerberus had revived me taking two years. They had created a clone…to provide me with spare limbs in case I needed them…"

"I can see where this is going," the prothean said, somewhat haughtily.

"I don't know the entire story yet. All I know is that they found ancient research into a weapon named the Crucible on Mars. They found that the Reapers answered to the Catalyst. My clone now controls the Reapers and has had half the galaxy merged with synthetics. She used the Crucible to do this," Shepard finished. It was painful to recount this story.

"That, indeed, is troubling, Commander. You have a plan I assume? I cannot allow you to destroy our work with your reckless ambitions," he said. She narrowed her eyes at him. It seemed he had an agenda of his own. It didn't take long for her to assess the corners of the small chamber, and what options she had left. His armour, although somewhat overwhelming in design, was ultimately not heavy. She looked at the weak points on his body, and for anything nearby to grab in case her well dealt blows did not make him keel over. Nothing. All this happened in a matter of seconds. Catching him off guard, she drove one foot into his before dealing a hit across his face. He barely stumbled, but it gave her enough room to reach the unit that housed potential weapons. Activating the small unit, the compartment door shot open to reveal certain items that were entirely foreign to her, except perhaps a prothean version of a heavy pistol. From behind, he attempted to grab her by the shoulders. She made him stumble by heeling and elbowing him in a matter of seconds.

His armour felt impenetrable and her bones quivered with the impact. She grabbed the pistol, which looked like it did not require the use of thermal clips.

"Commander!" the prothean bellowed behind her. She trained the pistol on him, at his triangular head. Now their stances were swapped, she could barely make out his distinctive features in the dark, giving him a somewhat menacing appearance.

"Take me to the spacecraft, prothean," she snapped. "Not one more word of it." He did not raise his hands when she instructed him to with a movement of the weapon.

"You are a fool, Commander Shepard. Tell me, this black ops group, Cerberus…Did your alliance remain with them after they revived you?" Shepard began to grind her teeth in anger. She wasn't sure what she was doing, or who she had even become in this strange turn of events, but she was beyond desperate.

"Don't presume anything," she barked, spraying spit. "I'm not explaining myself to you right now."

"You are unwilling to answer such a question, yet this clearly indicates a defensiveness born of shame," he replied smoothly. She cocked the gun.

"I'm desperate. I want my crew and my ship. I want to try and sort this mess out. I need medical attention. And I want _off_ this cesspit of a planet," she said. "I'm not afraid to fire a shot at you, prothean. Do you even have a name?" She wasn't sure, but she thought she saw him smirk, if it was possible at all.

"I barely know you, Commander, yet you are unsubtle. It was easy to discern your motives the moment I met you. Why else would you awaken me? You are not entirely unfamiliar with such ruthless actions either, are you?" She pursed her lips, still tightly holding the weapon. It was not exclusively untrue. He was doing a good job at aggravating her more and more by the minute.

"You don't know me," was all she could say. There was another silence. Convinced he was not going to help her, Shepard stepped forward in order to shoot him, although not outright kill him. She needed him. If Liara were here right now, the Asari would wring her neck. He was faster than she had anticipated. His arm shot out towards her right hand holding the pistol, driving her back into the unit and wall behind her. He kept her hand driven back into the wall, as she tried to twist out of his hold. Shepard pushed her arm equally as forcefully back, but she was not as strong as she was about a month ago. The lower part of her back was pressed painfully into the opened unit behind her, and she could hear a faint beeping from underneath her. She could also smell something strange, a chemical of some sort from the Prothean's armour. It was probably from the cryo-container, a smell that pervaded the room that she previously had not noticed. Her limbs began trembling underneath her, as the Prothean slowly began to crush her arm into the wall behind.

"Let go, Commander!" he ordered her loudly. Utterly obstinate, Shepard forced him back with all the remaining strength she had until he grabbed her injured arm and squeezed, making her shriek with pain.

He then kicked her off her feet, throwing her back into the hard ground. Hand still clutching the pistol tightly, she bent her legs together and forced her feet back into him. It was hard enough that he fell to his feet. Perhaps fifty thousand years had taken its toll slightly, she mused. Sitting back up, she brought the gun to his head. As soon as she did so, he hit her hard around the face and dealt her a steady kick to the abdomen. He had whipped the gun out of her hand. The blow had completely winded her, as she curled slowly into a ball, gasping for breath. Shepard heard him stand back up, fiddling with the weapon above her. _Pathetic, _she told herself. Unable to spend the rest of her dignity huddled on the floor, she got back up shakily, hoping to maintain an intimidating stare. He was occupied with the controls on the pistol for a moment.

Her cheek began to throb from where he had hit her, and she rubbed it visibly. _Childishly_. The white light from the cryo-container had encased the prothean in brighter light this time. She observed the thick carapace that was his head, and his brownish skin mottled with muted beige spots. She had been breathing slightly heavily, but he appeared wholly calm, as if he hadn't struggled with her.

"You are feverish with recklessness, Commander Shepard," he spoke. "I don't think you really intend to kill me. This weapon has to be charged first. I spared you the pain of firing an uncharged weapon." She raised her eyebrows incredulously. If she had to be honest with herself, she was now rather uncomfortable by her own behaviour. More so than telling him she was a Commander while standing in dirtied rags.

"In our time, society was heavily regulated. Speaking dishonourably to your superiors was an offensive act, with quite often severe consequences. Stealing spacecraft was punishable by death," he told her, still holding the pistol. She was growing uneasy, her previous arrogance had dissipated.

"Have all humans grown to be overconfident and superior such as yourself?" Shepard just stood there, feeling disgraced. She twisted away sharply, hugging her arms into her abdomen. What was there to do, she despaired. If only she had better strength, she would be able to overpower him. But was that right? She had, of course, never met a Prothean before. She stood with her back to him, looking at the ground. It was very quiet; all she could hear was the thump of her heart.

"Are you my superior?" she challenged him quietly. He ignored her.

"I have no desire to stay here, either, human," he spoke, angrier than she had ever heard him speak. Flinching, she remained where she was, but did not turn back round to face him. Shepard heard his feet move forward on the gravel beneath them.

"If you want to cooperate, I have some conditions. The cryo pods will be moved to the spacecraft, not awakened. We are taking a great risk, but I am confident of our research and work that went into building it. I will plot the course, and find a suitable place where the Reapers are not in full control. The next galaxy, I can only imagine. We will dock at a suitable station, and you can continue on. Find your crew. Save the galaxy," he said. She twisted back round, nostrils flared. He was closer than she had expected. She was about to angrily retort but he interrupted her before she could.

"I expect your full cooperation, Commander. I cannot allow you to endanger the lives of my people," he said with calm ease. She leaned forward, far too close for her comfort zone.

"Then I have only one condition; let me dock wherever I please. Not in the next damn galaxy," she said bitingly. All she knew about protheans so far was that they had relatively little facial expression. However she saw his jaw expand slightly in what she thought and correctly guessed was resentment.

"I was an aerospace engineer and pilot. My name is Hiul," he stated. "I do not trust you yet, Commander." With that, he sharply turned away from her. Feelings mutual, she thought.


	10. A Prothean Ship

The pods, drifting smoothly like a hovercar, moved by themselves down the great crevasse that led towards the prothean underground colony. The power outage was currently cut off, so they had to climb down a great set of stairs in the darkness, lit only by the tiny lights from the cryo-containers. The stairs were located just beyond the small pod chamber. Shepard struggled to breathe slightly as the air became thinner whilst they descended. Hiul noticed her shortage of breath, informing her when they reached the first level that there were modified spacesuits outside the spacecraft. It took an excruciating twenty minutes and it was painfully silent save for the sounds of their echoing feet. Eventually, they came to level ground in front a large blast-proof door. Emergency lights sat above the door, emitting an amber hue. Hiul touched the door with one three-fingered hand, closing his eyes.

Within a few seconds, they zipped open to reveal a darkened hangar, colossal in size. Hiul signalled for her to follow him. Lights flipped on as they approached the ship, which was smaller in size than she expected. Streamlined and much slighter than the Normandy, she noted the complete lack of windows and the enormous thrusters at the back. Despite her anger, she was impressed by this feat of engineering. The lack of windows reminded her somewhat of a Geth ship.

"What sort of technology?" she asked him, momentarily forgetting herself as they crossed the huge hangar. Hiul didn't bother to stop and turn to speak, he continued blithely ahead. He had no interest in what she had to say, apparently.

"Technology far more advanced than you could ever imagine," he said.

"Are the thrusters anti-proton?" Shepard asked, ignoring his cold indifference.

"We have advanced to beyond that kind of technology, as I said," was all she had as an answer. The entrance, which was concealed at the side of the ship, was only revealed when Hiul approached it. A ramp lowered itself to the shiny floor beneath them. Hiul turned back round, but not to face her. His eyes looked behind towards the four other pods. She guessed she had final access and stepped aside to let them pass. She watched impassively as the four pods moved beside her and up the ramp into the ship, turning the corner and disappearing. Shepard noted that Hiul had the pistol holstered.

"Am I making a grave mistake in letting you on this ship?" he said, turning back round to face her.

She fixed him with a steady stare.

"That's something only you can figure out for yourself," she said. He signalled for her to enter the ship before him. The door silently closed behind them as they stood in the airlock. She noted a large cabinet filled with all-in-one beige spacesuits, and simple over the mouth masks. Shepard quickly snatched the mask out of the cabinet, which had opened again without instruction. The mask fitted over her mouth, forming perfectly to her skin. A couple of seconds passed and she was able to regain her breathing.

"The technology inside the breathing mask reads your physiology," explained Hiul behind her. "It supplies you with the correct amount of elements that you require in order to breathe."

The pods had disappeared off down a thin corridor on their right, while on the immediate left, Hiul walked past her to access the bridge. It was circular in size, and a large unit with various touchscreen controls surrounded a holographic projection emitting coordinates along with a technical view of outside. Not much else was in the room, unlike the Normandy's bridge, which was filled with various controls panels and various items of equipment clogging the ceiling.

The lack of windows was somewhat disorientating, but she had to admit it was an effective design. Hiul began touching the screens in front of him, barely moving his hands carefully across. It seemed like the protheans communicated by touch, she noticed the clear lack of written and verbal communication. There were only numerical readings on his screen that she was unable to comprehend. She stood there, almost a little bit sheepishly, unsure how to interact with him for a brief moment. The Commander had to admit they had got off to rather a bad start and all because of her. He was still busy at the controls, plotting coordinates. She built herself up. _You could be the bigger person, you know. _Her pride and bolshiness seemingly won.

"I presume you have a _washroom_ on board?" she asked. She could feel the giant thrusters booming, shaking the entire ship somewhat. He replied without turning back to look at her.

"The medical facility is one level below. You need medical attention, Commander. Otherwise your sepsis will complicate further into septicaemia," he answered. His voice was unfriendly.

"It will take us but a few moments to exit the planet. Once we activate, what is to you, the FTL drive core, I will attend to you in the medical bay." She twisted angrily towards the elevator just behind the bridge. She grabbed a spacesuit, briefly glancing at the material, which felt rubbery and unusual. It was the smallest she could find, and she highly doubted it would fit her, considering it had been made for a prothean. The elevator zoomed down and opened onto a large medical bay. The lights switched on automatically. It seemed the ship had taken her to where she needed without instruction. The medical bay like the bridge was unfilled yet sleek in design.

Shepard briefly forgot that his spacecraft, although fifty thousand years old, had been perfectly preserved and unused. Bright lights shone an eerie blue, which danced off the various instruments around the room. Large robotic-looking arms hung down from the ceiling and beeping machines built into the wall slowly whirred. A small bed had shot out from a compartment in the wall as she approached, shivering. It looked uncomfortable with only a thin paper sheet on top of it. She lost her balance and fell back to the floor, and was violently sick. Her hands were covered in it.

"Shit…" she muttered. She presumed the ship had an AI, who must have alerted Hiul. The ship rumbled beneath her greatly, as she struggled to get back to her feet. The panels on the floor gave way and lifted her up onto the bed. The bed was surprisingly comfy. She felt gravity force her deeper into the bottom of the bed as the ship exited the hangar. _You're going to sort this fucking mess out. _

* * *

When Shepard's eyes slowly flickered open, she was greeted with an unfamiliar sight. A strange bipedal creature stood in front of her, watching her carefully. She heard clicks and beeps in the background; it was remote and alien. Slowly but surely, it began to filter back to her. The occurrence of _total bullshit_.

"Where are we?" she demanded, sitting up quickly.

"Commander, I would advise against any reckless exertion," the Prothean, Hiul, told her sternly. It took a moment to regain her bearings. The medical bay, blue and whirring. The strange ship. The prothean whom she had been close to shooting. Her eyes darted to his waist. The cursed pistol still sat in its holster. He really didn't trust her, after all this time now? She bit her lip, almost smiling to herself. She would've done the same.

"There is a station, in what you now called the Terminus Systems. Relatively safe and out of the way of any overseeing Reapers for the moment, although many of them litter across the area. We shall dock there, and you can hereafter continue your mission," Hiul replied, not looking at her. He was taking readings off a small hand-held terminal. Shepard looked down at herself. There was an IV drip in her left arm, and her arm was wrapped in a thin rubbery-looking material. She was still dressed in her dirty tunics and trousers.

"How long have I been out?" she barely whispered. Hiul looked at her this time.

"Two days, Commander," he answered emotionlessly. She frowned, expecting a longer answer.

"Anything else?" she snapped. Hiul put down the terminal, locking it into place on the wall.

"Humans have a very weak and flawed physiology," he spoke stiffly. "You were suffering from shock, but I stabilised with intravenous fluids and antibiotics. It has not developed into a further infection." He turned away, marching towards the door.

"The washroom is to the right of you, via the door on your right. Our current ETA to the designated system is approximately seven days." With that, he left the room, leaving a cold atmosphere in the room. She swallowed painfully. A week with him, on this ship, which barely had enough room to move around. She realised she would have to spend her time carefully, without getting in his way. However, Shepard also knew she wasn't holding back on trying to contact Edi again. Trouble was, she had nothing to go on. She realised the drip had been taken out of her arm, and shakily rose to her feet off the bed. Her eyes moved slowly around the metallic, shiny surface of the room.

Taking the spacesuit that had been placed on something that closely resembled a sideboard, Shepard walked towards the door that zipped open before she could even think about touching an access panel. Raising her eyebrows, she stepped out into the surprisingly warm, long, narrow corridor. She heard a distant whir, but barely felt the rumble of the ship's thrusters as she walked into the washroom. A fairly standard washroom, with a washstand in one corner and a small cubicle with what she presumed contained a toilet. The only difference was that instead of space for a shower, was a bathtub. She blinked at it for several moments, before checking behind her the door was locked. Nothing indicated it was, in fact she couldn't even tell where the door was.

The tub had a small screen at the side of it, and began to fill from four different holes at each corner. The water was clear. It was a blessing to remove the hated tunic and trousers from her body. As soon as she stepped into the luxurious warmth of the tub, a panel in the floor opened and the dirtied clothes had disappeared into the depths of the ship. Nothing to wash her hair with, she sank underneath the water for a moment, watching the ceiling through the water above her.

Her hair drifted around her vision. By the end of her bathing, the water was brown and somewhat bloodied. She couldn't remember the last time she'd taken a bath. It was utterly bizarre to see such a thing on board a military vessel. But then again, was this vessel military? Had it been built for military purposes? Shepard remembered the huge thrusters but no state-of-the-art cannons. Frowning, she picked up the spacesuit, looking at it for a few moments. Pulling out a khaki-coloured jumpsuit that was inside, she hastily yanked it on. To her astonishment, the jumpsuit seemed to fit itself to her body, allowing her enough room simultaneously.

She felt at a loss for once, when usually she had learned to feel at home on spaceships. After being asleep on drugs for two days she was in no mood to lie back down again. Instead, she decided to explore. It felt extremely unlikely that the ship could run with just one member on board. Along the corridor on her right was another door. Shepard headed straight towards it, expecting the door to open immediately as it had done before. This time it did not move.

For a few seconds she stared at the door with her teeth gritted. Her still wet hair dripped down her back. Her feet felt cold on the metallic surface below her. Even after washing with new clothes, she still felt there was much dignity to be had. No shoes, wet hair, nothing underneath her jumpsuit…It was difficult to imagine she had led a squadron onto a hidden collector base a month ago. Or fifteen years ago, as it were. It was time to take her chances. _Face the prothean_. Edi had to be contacted.

* * *

Shepard went back through to the cockpit. Hiul's back was turned to her, busy fiddling with the controls. Why hadn't he woken his crew from their cryo-slumber? He froze and whizzed round to face her as soon as she heard her approach him. She wished she had Joker to tell her the coordinates, the update on the drive core, anything about the journey and the ship that she always took for granted. What made it worse, was that her arms were crossed, already indicating a defensive stance. His eyes slowly drifted to her bare, white feet on the ground. Ignoring his somewhat intense stare, she spoke.

"Do you intend to keep your crew in cryo stasis permanently?" she asked. The floor below her was so cold it made the balls of her feet ache.

"For now." He promptly turned back to analysing his coordinates. A minute or so passed between them before she decided to move further into the cockpit, her eyes roving over every inch of the surprisingly empty room.

"I presume you have an armoury here on board?" Shepard began again. It rather felt like she was walking on thin ice.

"I advise you return to the medical bay. You are still not fully recovered," was the only answer she had, and without any sort of eye contact. It's going to be like this, is it, she thought. Shepard briefly looked over towards the terminal but could not make any sense from the information displayed, unlike what she previously saw over Joker's shoulder.

"What's our current status?" she tried, although she was beyond desperate to know. Hiul still did not turn to look at her.

"All systems are fully functional and in working order," he replied, the deep baritone of his voice vibrating through the room. Shepard marched back out of the room as quickly as she could. The only place she had to stomp to was the elevator. Perhaps she could find the armoury herself.

* * *

Commander Shepard later found herself sitting at the solid table in the mess area, next to the galley. She wasn't sure what the prothean terms were for these areas, but she didn't care either. She decided she wasn't interested much in the protheans. Shepard was more interested what would happen if she ever found her crew again. If her clone had sabotaged any hope of defeating the Reapers, and became the sole controller of them, her image was tainted forever. She had been expecting the Alliance to contact her immediately after her suicide mission, to place her under arrest for what happened in the Viper Nebula, not to mention her involvement with Cerberus. _What a mess._ Anyone who didn't know the full story would assume she was a vindictive and despotic tyrant, who now controlled the galaxy using the Reapers. She wished she could glance out of a window, and gaze at the deep space. The stars that twinkled. It was a great comfort to her, watching the beautiful vastness.

Thankfully not everyone in the galaxy knew her appearance, and the clone's body was desecrated the minute she assumed control of the Reapers. Shepard hoped there was someone out there who perhaps suspected something was wrong. Used their initiative, _hell_, even their imagination. She hoped there was someone alive out there still, such as Liara T-Soni, who knew and trusted her enough to realise that it hadn't been the real Shepard to betray them. However, with so little evidence, it was difficult to disprove. She would have to assume a new identity, perhaps a new appearance. It made her feel cold thinking about it as she stared blankly at the table in front. Everyone in the Alliance knew what she looked like. She presumed a lot of humanity knew what she looked like, after her actions on Elysium. If not that, the events on the Citadel in 2183.

Her stomach grumbled beneath her. Abruptly, the table in front of her moved, slightly startling her. A circular section of the table turned inwards and rose with a plate of steaming food. Shepard stared at the food in front of her. All of it was unrecognisable, and as old as the damn ship.

"Based on your physiology readings in the med bay, the appropriate nutrients have been supplied which is not harmful to the human digestive system," the ship suddenly spoke. Unlike Edi, the computerised voice was androgynous.

"Er…" began Shepard, somewhat surprised.

"Your physiology has no known allergies in the current food groupings provided and resulting in no provocation of anaphylaxis." Shepard saw something curiously like bread, almost white like that of a tortilla wrap. Hesitantly, she picked it up. Despite being an incredibly advanced race, it appeared protheans did not use utensils to eat their food. Perhaps they consume through an IV drip, she thought. Even better…through _touching _it, her mind tartly retorted. It looked like an assortment of vegetables that sat on her plate, but it took her five minutes before she could bring herself to eat.

"You will find it is very nutritious," said a familiar voice. Shepard sharply brought her head up to look at Hiul who stood there as tall and proud as ever. She unexpectedly felt self-conscious. Her mind provided her a useful outlet.

"Your ship has an AI?" Her voice was louder than she intended, echoing off the walls uncomfortably. Hiul walked up to her, but far enough so that he stood away from the table. He always seemed to stand rigid with his arms at his sides. She noticed it was different to other bipedal species, who sometimes had an uncanny human habit of standing with their arms crossed.

"Yes…and no," he replied to her. It seemed as if he was waiting for her to eat.

"What do you mean?" she persisted. It was always so notoriously difficult to read another species. He seemed to be bereft of any facial expression.

"It is neither an artificial intelligence nor a virtual intelligence. I cannot explain it in your language…" he began, momentarily tearing his gaze away from her. "We knew the dangers of creating AI's. The research and creation of such things were heavily monitored in our culture. Organic and synthetic beings cannot live side by side." Shepard gaped at him for a moment, before looking away.

"You state it like a solid fact," she murmured.

"There is more than enough evidence to prove it so, in my time, and in yours," he retorted. His tone had changed. Shepard's face creased to form a scowl. In the past she had, like most people, assumed such a fact. However over time, she realised there was a much bigger picture to look at.

"That's a rather narrow-minded way to think about things," she said. She saw his hand twitch for a fraction of a second.

"Whatever you humans think about us, we were far more powerful an empire than any other of the races. It was us, or them. Nothing else. There were too many risks in creating intelligent synthetics. We had learnt that from our past, early in our development. We united all sentient organic life in order to defeat a hostile synthetic intelligence. Those who resisted were crushed. Everyone had become prothean," he said with a concealed fierceness. Shepard narrowed her eyes at him.

"Sounds like that was, ultimately, your downfall," she responded. She was more than aware she was treading on very thin ice, considering he was her current host. Hiul gazed at her, before glancing down at her food. She wasn't going to attempt to eat it. After all, he could easily kill her off. Even if that wasn't the case, something foreign and fifty thousand years old wasn't going to cut it for her stomach either.

"If I wanted to kill you, I would've done so already," he said, less darkly this time than a minute ago.

"I haven't eaten properly in a month. The first thing I'd rather eat is something familiar," Shepard reminded him, somewhat childishly.

"It appears you don't have a choice Commander," he spoke frostily. "This, or IV." She looked at him defiantly for a further minute or so, but she realised she was being nonsensical. Her hand reached towards the white bread, picking it up in her hands. She saw it was designed to scoop the various pieces of vegetable up, reminding her briefly of certain cultures on Earth. As she did so, she remembered he was stood there watching her. Aggravation had finally beaten tension.

"Are you going to stand there watching me the entire time?" she snapped at him. Shepard suddenly felt like some test subject for a curious scientist. A scientist that watched her every move, ready to record it down in some notebook. Not wanting to let him win, she scooped the rather strange food up with the bread, which had been doused in sauce. The food rolled around in her mouth, tingling the senses on the tip of her tongue. Her jaw felt stiff as she chewed and then swallowed. It was unlike anything she had tasted, but not so vile as she'd experienced before.

"The ship will set you three meals a day, in here," he said. Her teeth gritted tightly as she glowered at him.

"The same thing, every meal?" she said.

"The armoury and cockpit has denied access. Your quarters will be in the medical bay," he said.

Hiul gave her one last glance before walking out through the door that had opened for him. Shepard, despite enjoying the taste somewhat, was infuriated. Her former thoughts before he entered the room had driven her to a familiar despondency. Taking the metal plate, she threw it across the room in fury. The food was flung into the air and splattered onto the door opposite her. It was like she had gone from one prison to another.


	11. Hostility

If there was anything Shepard had a lack of in the past few years, was a comforting bath. She peed in the tub every time she used it. There wasn't anything distinguishable like a toilet, except a small hole in the wall. She preferred not to imagine. As she sat in the unusual tub a day later, it did not relax her in the slightest. She avoided Hiul, spending her time sleeping in the medical bay. Later she found out that all the doors were barred, and she was confined only to the med bay and the mess. She couldn't bring herself to eat the food, and anyway, her obstinacy won out. It felt, as immature as it was, a great defiance against the great prothean captor. Her sleep was wracked with feverish dreams. Ones of Reapers, of her crewmates hating her, of being forever cast out…Ones of the Alliance putting her on trial and giving a death sentence as the outcome…Of Garrus refusing to help her when she most needed it…When she woke, her forehead was dabbled with large globules of sweat. The ship was talking to her, as her eyesight adjusted.

"I recommend an intravenous drip for nutrition, Commander," it spoke softly. "You are not recovering well from malnutrition. Your left forearm wound has completely healed and I advise removing the necessary dressing." Sitting on the edge of the bed, Shepard pulled up the sleeve of her jumpsuit roughly. With one single move, she ripped the plastic-looking dressing off her arm and let it fall to the ground.

"I'm surprised you refer to yourself as I," Shepard said to the ship. "Using 'I' indicates you are a capable individual. That's not on the prothean agenda." There was a brief moment of silence.

"I choose the most appropriate way to communicate as such to you, Commander," it replied with some hesitation. It was clearly not used to challenge.

"Using the subject pronoun 'I' is appropriate in your particular language. The protheans do not have a language like yours."

Shepard ignored it and glanced at her arm. A new scar to add to all her other ones, although this one was still significantly purple, due to the recentness of it. She wasn't a battle maiden ravaged with war scars, but her face, unfortunately was indicative of Cerberus work. Anything before that had been wiped away. He fingers cautiously touched her face. She could feel the small crevices in each of her cheeks, horrifying her slightly. Jumping off the uncomfortable bed, she walked towards the wall. It was shiny enough so that she could see her reflection. One glance was enough. Each cheek marked. Pulling herself away from the wall, she sat herself down on the floor and began to do sit-ups. When she reached twenty, a low for her, she looked around for anything to begin chin-ups. She resorted to press-ups. The medical bay felt oppressive, as her nose nearly touched the cold floor surface. _Nine. _Her elbows shook. Beads of sweat formed on her brow. It had been a couple of days already. Only a week, he had said. She hoped he would find an appropriate station, although the consequence of that was unknown. With the Terminus Systems mostly unguarded, whatever widespread corruption had already resided there was probably running rampant by now. She had to think of a plan, she had to try and make contact with Edi once more. Shepard found herself suddenly with the uncomfortable thought of coaxing, even resorting to pleading Hiul to let her use a comm system. _Fourteen. _Her arms wobbled and she sank to the floor, rolling onto her back. She was more unwell than she had realised.

"I recommend more rest, Commander," said the ship. Shepard continued to lie on the floor staring at the immaculate ceiling above her. Before she could retort, the ship spoke once again.

"You need to eat something, Commander." Shepard frowned and pulled herself back up, walking towards the mess. Something else that bothered her was the ignorance of time. She wasn't interested in what the prothean equivalent was; she just hankered to know whether it was morning, noon, or night. The food was waiting for her on the table again, and it was exactly the same as before. Her stomach turned somewhat. She sat with resignation at the table, staring at the food.

"The time, ship?" she asked quickly.

"Earth time varies in different regions-"

"Toronto," snapped Shepard.

"Approximately 1800 hours," replied the ship impassively. Shepard began to spoon the food into her mouth as quickly as humanly possible. Her throat began to constrict, and her mouth watered. Whatever thoughts she had previously about the food had vanished now. The taste and texture was unfamiliar. Half of the plate had been eaten before she stopped and pushed the plate away. The last bite had gone slowly down her throat. She tried with all her might not to gag.

"I see you have refrained from decorating the walls with it this time," said Hiul suddenly from the doorway. Shepard jumped a little, although quickly recovered. She remained quiet, watching him. What she wanted to ask was on the tip of her tongue, but she couldn't quite bring herself to do it. He made her feel small, insignificant. Perhaps that was how he viewed her. If humans were somewhere in the Palaeolithic period in Hiul's era, then it must be difficult for him to view her as anything but a primitive ape. As usual, Shepard's temper won over rationality.

"Yes I suppose for a primitive ape you wouldn't be surprised," she countered. Hiul stared at her silently for a few moments before he walked up to the table, and took a seat opposite. He knew many ways in which he'd make her uncomfortable. She didn't show her insecurity, however.

"I can tell you want something, human," he replied, his voice deep enough it reverberated through the air. She bit her tongue on her first retort, and swallowed.

"When you find an appropriate station-" she began.

"I have found a specific station and have set the coordinates," he bit back swiftly. Shepard glared at him for a few moments, childishly.

"Right. So that station could be full of batarians who have bloodlust for humans. Corrupt mercs formed up of different species, asari, humans and turians alike. I could walk into a trap. Fifteen years have moved on for me, leaving the galaxy in the worst state it's ever been-"

"Has malnutrition and sepsis corrupted your mind?" Hiul barked, standing up, the chair behind him had scraped back on the floor ear-piercingly loudly. "The galaxy has been in much worse states than you claim. You are beginning to sound like a petulant child. I know what you want Commander; this ship and its weapons, for your own agenda. You are corrupt as the other species that you speak so distastefully of," he countered. He was angering her beyond comprehension. Pure dislike flared up in her blood. She continued to sit there, staring at him.

"I know a great deal about you, Commander Shepard," Hiul spoke quietly, looking momentarily at the floor. It was as if he was preparing himself for something. Her heart began to beat very hard, like a hammer on cloth against her chest.

"Your mercilessness flourishes in your blood. The battle on the Citadel in 2183 was won by you, but at a cost of the Council and the Destiny Ascension. After your death the human black ops group named Cerberus brought you back to life. Cerberus whom you joined subsequently. Later in that same year, 2185, you mercilessly destroyed an entire system killing off everyone who resided there." He stopped for a moment; looking at her with intensity she might have guessed was malevolence. She slowly stood up, keeping her eyes on him.

"So if you are wondering why I refuse you to access any other part of the ship, then maybe you can see my reasoning," he finished. Her mouth felt dry as a result.

"You don't know me," she spoke, shaking with anger. "I can see your conceit and selfish disregard for the feelings of others clouds your judgement. You look upon me as merely a primeval being who cannot possibly comprehend such advances of your own species. But your arrogance is no more superior than that you assume of humans," she finished. Hiul, for a brief moment, appeared as if he was going to assault her. However, he merely turned away and marched towards the door. His hand was on the doorframe as it opened for him.

"You are to return to the medical bay. The next possible station is two and a half hours away to be exact. You can take your leave when we arrive," Hiul returned coldly, and walked out of the room. Shepard was left to stand staring at the door.

* * *

Whatever he wanted of her, she was not going to listen. Shepard ignored his order and instead walked out of the mess area, towards the elevator. The door would not open, even on her command. He was nowhere to be seen in the corridor.

"Ship, open the elevator door!" she demanded.

"I cannot. I am on strict instructions from Captain Hiul," replied the toneless voice.

"Maybe you can instruct him to listen to me! I am not taking leave on any station! I need to contact my AI that I managed to speak to back on that dwarf planet," Shepard pleaded. Her original plan was to force her way through the armoury, grab the plasma weapons, and take control of the ship. Perhaps she was going mad.

"Please return to the medical bay, Commander Shepard," spoke the ship.

"I don't think so…" she muttered, turning back round.

Her eyes darted around the corridor, finally looking at what appeared to be a fire extinguisher. It was slightly different in design and style to what she was used to, but nonetheless a weapon. Breaking the glass with the crook of her elbow, Shepard pulled out the extinguisher with her bare hands and walked over to the small control pad she had not seen until now. It was to the right of the elevator. With every ounce of strength she had, Shepard bashed open the control unit. Small sparks, like charged beams shot out from the unit. The ship must have alerted Hiul, for she heard something from above her. Shepard pulled out the various wires housed inside the control unit. She had to open the doors, but she might as well been looking at a cryptic code; indecipherable despite her technical hacking expertise. Her fingers pulled away the two single wires. Behind it was various touchscreen buttons.

It was like a maze. She hadn't liked the way he had talked to her, as if he knew her. Shepard wondered if his sensory ability had allowed him to look into her mind, much like the prothean beacon in a way. Her fingers fiddled with the useless controls, before she began to destroy whatever was there with the end of the extinguisher. It crackled in front of her, but it was difficult to do further damage. Abruptly the extinguisher was wrenched from her hands. Shepard twisted round quickly to face him. Hiul stood there with his hand raised slightly, his three fingers spread evenly. The small mass effect field encased the extinguisher above her head in a cobalt light. He let it gently float to the floor, his eyes on her the entire time. The yellowness of them seemed to glow in the dark corridor. She noticed that the corridors on the ship were not very well lit, for whatever reason. A biotic. _Great_. She wondered why he hadn't used his biotics in their first skirmish.

"I only ask to contact my AI," Shepard told him. He was quiet for a moment or two, contemplating.

"You think I trust you with that?" he said. "I can only imagine in your human culture it is discourteous to treat one's host with the defacement of their property." Shepard didn't give him a reply at first, folding her arms defensively.

"You can contact whatever is left of your crew on the station," he told her coldly, and went to turn away. She had no idea where he'd come from. The extinguisher sat there stupidly on the floor.

"There's not sufficient comm technology like there is on here," she shouted over to him before he could disappear into what looked like private quarters. "Even if there was, I would run the risk of attracting unwanted attention." Hiul whipped round quickly, staring at her with pure scorn. He didn't move towards her, staying where he was.

"Even if that's what you require, I wouldn't allow it. You haven't proven yourself very trustworthy, Commander. Or honourable," was his reply. He disappeared, the darkness swallowing him, the door shutting tightly. Shepard stared at his door for what seemed a long time. Her fists were curled up in rage. She was like a bird in a cage. No matter how much she screeched, pecked at the bars, and flew around incessantly, the enclosure would not give way.

* * *

It was two days before they would reach their destined location. He had been studying the star maps extensively over the last few days. The clever technology in front of him had amalgamated a three-dimensional map on the screen in front of him, away from his usual coordinates. He had also spent his time trying to read up on the various amount of history, which he needed to fill in. After all, fifty thousand years was a long time to be in cryo stasis. Their intended station, as he found, was a medical facility run by a private human company. It was the best he could come up with, and besides he found it was the most inconspicuous place he could drop her off. He did not intend to drop her off where there were other starfield fighters that could evoke hostility. Or whatever these primitive species called them. This facility was in what they now called the Terminus System, the far side of the Attican Traverse. It was fraught with conflict and worse than ever since the domination of the galaxy by the Reapers.

He didn't have to read much into what happened, but it took him a fair while. It was strange to read language and a lot of extranet sites, as they called it, were heavily guarded. The results were disturbing to him. Commander Shepard of the _Normandy SR-2_, after running a suicide mission on a collector Base near the galaxy's core, had gone missing for several weeks. The Alliance had requested her immediate return in order to place her under house arrest, under war crime charges. Weeks later, she was seen on Mars with Cerberus. A prothean superweapon plan that had been recently uncovered had gone missing. The plan had been the unfinished Crucible, last worked on by his people. Hiul sat there consuming the information. Commander Shepard had discovered the Catalyst, the overseer and embodiment of the consciousness of the Reapers. Following such events, Shepard decided to become the master AI of the Reapers, as well as synthesising half of the galaxy. The information he was reading was about Commander Shepard. A profile photograph gave him clear evidence. The appearance and history was the same as the human that was residing downstairs. He scolded himself for not finding out sooner. He placed his palm on a flat screen to the right of him that instantly lit up.

_Ship. The location of the human_, he thought. _Medical Bay, _was his answer. _Secure the door until my arrival. _

He took a sidearm from a drawer underneath the unit he was facing. It took him only a matter of seconds to reach the door before he commanded the ship to reopen it. She was not on the bed as he expected her to be. His eyes glanced around, for a moment contemplating the misinformation the ship had given him. He didn't have much time to think much else, for an unfamiliar elbow shot out in front of him. He stumbled back, momentarily blinded by pain. He almost felt surprised at her resilience, as she thumped him in the knee, nearly knocking him to the ground. Ignoring the pain, he seized hold of her wrist, attempting to throw her to the floor, but she twisted her arm and forcefully jerked her elbow backwards. His grip slid quickly.

"What have I done _now_?" she said breathlessly, almost derisive. Hiul held the sidearm up towards the middle of her forehead.

"You are the Catalyst? The Reaper's master AI?" he spat at her. Shepard stopped and gaped at him, taking in a lungful of air.

"What bullshit have you read?" came her reply. Hiul stepped forward, cocking his weapon and pressing it into her forehead. She flinched as the cool metal of the weapon touched her skin, but she did not allow herself to recoil away from him.

"Answer me now, you _human,_" he snarled at her.

"Fuck you," she spat. Before he could respond to her insolence, she spoke again. "You can't possibly shoot me here, without breaching your hull or at least damaging-"

"That's what would happen with your current technology," he laughed disparagingly at her. She abruptly pulled away from the aim of his weapon, jerking his arm upwards with her hands. With every ounce of strength she had, she pushed him towards the wall hoping to jar him enough that he'd drop his gun. He equally pushed back just as hard. They struggled for a few moments. Shepard tried to keep his arm held vertical to avoid being shot, but he twisted his arm just as she had done earlier. With his other free arm, he grabbed the nape of her neck and slammed her to the ground. It happened within a matter of seconds. He had used whatever was left of his biotic strength to do so. His biotics were weak and not as strong as they used to be. His implants needed to be re-fitted. He stood back up, breathing heavily. Perhaps he had rid himself of her, a mere irritable insect. She was still. He turned back out of the room. Ship tried to correspond with him. Hiul waved his hand in dismissal.

* * *

**AN: **Thank you to those you have favourited, followed and reviewed! I am suuuper excited you are enjoying it!


	12. The Green Planet

It would take a lot more to kill her. Commander Shepard woke half an hour later with a headache the size of a supernova. All she could remember was being accused of something. Whatever was left of her pride had been vanquished. She couldn't remember the last time she felt this powerless. _Maybe when you were sixteen? _She batted that thought away. What was wrong with her? Had she lost her touch? The great Commander Shepard, _Saint Shepard…_ He had accused her of the clone's actions. The bastard must have read whatever was on the extranet about her. A cold shiver went through her as she stood back up and walked towards the bed. She asked ship to give her the time. 0058 Toronto hours. Her eyes slowly closed.

Meanwhile, Hiul sat in the cockpit trying to read the coordinates in front him. ETA was currently four hours and twenty-seven minutes away. He would be rid of her forever. He was plotting a course for Andromeda. It would take him a year to reach the nearest suitable system, currently unchartered in this time. In his time, parts of Andromeda had been colonised, although the work had been minimal. He had to admit to himself, quietly, that attempting to kill Shepard as he did was an unwise move. That she wasn't the Shepard he had accused her of, without solid evidence. He was unsure where his anger had come from. He almost wished he were dead and gone like the rest of his people. Hiul began to wonder which outcome was worse for the system: watched under the constant eye of a dictator or the alternative, which ultimately wiped out his race. The latter, was his final conclusion. His mind drifted to her in the medical bay. The ship told him he hadn't killed her outright. He briefly considered going down to see her, but what would he say? Hiul refused to feel guilt, but felt it finally when she entered the cockpit. _How could a human make me feel like this? _Her eyes were like pebbles, cold and hard. All he could see was tiny red glints in them.

"Current ETA?" she snapped. He saw she still had dried blood around her nose.

"Four hours and forty minutes." She roughly wiped her nose with the back of her hand. A smear of blood formed a stripe on the skin of her hand. There a three minute silence, an unbearable awkwardness that made his skin prickle slightly. She seemed to be staring at him unblinkingly, waiting for him to allow her access to the comm unit.

"The station we are approaching will have adequate communication facilities," he began. She stepped forward, seeing she was trying to contain her rage. It was a temper that didn't seem very well kept, at the best of times.

"I _need_ to use your Prothean technology! It was your damn comm unit that granted me a necessary wavelength to contact my AI!" It was a battle of stares. Her red glinting eyes were enough to take on his set of four. He was impressed at her unflinching gaze; staring contests were a popular pastime in his culture. Hiul could tell her desperation overpowered her, and almost felt merciful. Unfortunately, his pride won over. He was still sat down when a small bright light began flashing on the panel desk. Immediately he pressed a pad beside him, where a screen came up. It showed a large frigate not far behind them. It had been refitted and repainted with extra attachments, yet had the appearance of a pirate ship.

"Looks like an old Turian frigate. How the hell have they managed to find us? Or even keep up with us?" the Commander said.

"The ship has been decelerating for twenty hours now, we are approaching our destination," he replied. He wasn't sure how the pirate frigate that was rapidly approaching them had managed to track his ship. His technology was surely far more advanced than the junk behind him. It seemed he was mistaken, when the frigate began to fire. Although untested, Hiul knew his ship was state-of-the-art technology. The shields encasing them protected them. They were not moving at the previous pace, due to deceleration.

"Can you not engage the core, increase the speed again?" the human asked him. He found it strange that despite being a military commander of a ship, she had not a lot of specialisation and knowledge in engineering and physics. _Did these humans all have separate tasks?_ He had to admit there was barely any fear in her voice. Hiul then remembered she had died after her ship was blown apart, then rebuilt again. She had seen it all before.

"It will overheat," he snapped. The ship started to shake around them, as they endured more attack from behind. He waved his hand at her, in order for her to sit down. She was leaning over his chair. Did she do such a thing when in command of her own? She barely acknowledged him but did so nonetheless. The military in his cycle was ruthlessly strict: standing over one's superior like that would've resulted in severe punishment.

"Guess your technology isn't advanced as you think," she muttered. His hearing was impeccable, but he didn't bother to comment knowing it would be pointless. These humans were more stupid than he thought. Advanced or not, it was going against the known laws of physics. It was impossible to condition the core to increase speed after deceleration; they'd fry within an instant. His hands drifted over the controls effortlessly, moving the ship in such a way they avoided further blasts. It was about ten minutes before the ship brought up a diagnostic chart in front of him. The pirate frigate behind them was still on their tail and managed to break his shield down to eighteen percent.

"It seems in the last fifty thousand years, these primitives have engineered great feats of aerospace technology," he said, more to himself than her. She didn't look at him, sat forward and tense in her seat.

"We might have to prepare to leave," she said. He was listening to the ship silently. Before she could question him further, an almighty blast shook the vessel to its very core. It reverberated so that the floor beneath them felt like it momentarily collapsed. The desk unit in front of Hiul flashed, a dozen lights lighting up his reptilian features. He wanted to continue, to persevere. But he had severely misjudged the capability of these species of the future and the capability of his ship. He had been one of the engineers who had worked furiously hard on creating this ship, but it was untested. Hiul heard a voice beside him, shouting.

"Do you have escape pods?" The human was yelling at him.

Hiul glanced at her stonily, and moved out of his seat. He marched out of the cockpit, hoping the human would follow him. The escape pods were located on the same deck as the medical bay, accessed through a small door that had previously been invisible. The door opened automatically, clearly expecting them. All around him he could hear his ship being torn apart, with his previous crewmembers inside. It was unforeseeable. He spoke nothing in his distress, as they darted through a narrow corridor, arriving at the escape pod door. In the corridor they were briefly decontaminated before entering. The pod broke away from the ship at high speed, pushing them back against their seats. For once Hiul wished for a window to look outside: not at the remains of his ship, but to gaze at the stars around them to avoid looking at her. He was afraid he'd do something regretful if he looked at her for a second longer, with her large round, primate eyes. Did all these species evolve with only two eyes? How was it possible? He didn't dwell on her for a moment longer. He shut his eyes, meditating, as the pod moved towards the green planet below.

* * *

Hours later

When Shepard opened her eyes, she realised that Hiul opposite was unconscious. Their pod had made a rough landing; she could see wires hanging down from apparent damage and smoke filled the interior. She wrinkled her nose at the smell as she struggled to unstrap herself, which proved difficult. There was a leak due to the crash, and whatever she could smell was probably harmful. It was unusual she thought, amidst her worry, to see Hiul's yellow eyes closed. As soon as she contemplated this, he jolted awake. She spotted a thick crimson fluid at the side of his head, which had a consistency akin to blood. Dread formed as a lump in her throat, as she tore at the seat strap cursing the so-called superior Prothean technology. There was tightness in her chest and her eyes were smarting. Hiul swiftly moved out of his seat, unsheathing a knife from a small holster in his leg. He freed her promptly from the seat.

"There is a high level of chlorine that has infiltrated the air systems. This pod is not designed to be used for long periods." Shepard grabbed her helmet, as did he, and followed him out of the pod. Mist, of a mustard green colour, surrounded the immediate vicinity as they jumped out of the pod. The ground beneath them felt solid, but looked a short distance away more hollow and soft. The mist was thick was hung over the ground like a veil, and unlike cloud it did not form together. The ground appeared to be covered with rust, charred dirt and discoloured water.

"Where the hell are we?" Shepard muttered, more to herself. Hiul already had his pistol at the ready, and shoved his knife into her hands. It had a serrated spear blade with a curved handle, larger than her hand. It was peculiar to hold, and she noticed the intricate, foreign carvings on the handle.

"The pod was unable to take any readings due to power failure and my datapad was crushed in the falling. We'll find out soon enough." Hiul began to walk forward, testing the ground carefully with the balls of his unclothed feet. He dipped the tips of his fingers into a nearby puddle, smelling it carefully.  
"The atmosphere sure is hostile," Shepard said, clipping the knife to her leg via a string on her spacesuit. "What is that stench?" Her eyes still watered painfully, her breath wheezy.

"Chlorine. It is more hazardous to your inferior respiratory system than mine. You are already displaying symptoms."

She tried to contain a biting remark, but it was proving more and more difficult with him. Why did he have to insult her at every twist and turn? The land around them was also hostile. As they stepped through dank puddles, occasionally slipping on something unpleasant, fifteen minutes passed and the gas around them was still thick. Hiul touched the ground below him suddenly, closing his eyes.

"What?"

"This planet. It was here still in my time. It had been chartered, though largely ignored because such an atmosphere had already been formed."

"Where?" He had to think for a moment, how to describe it to her so she'd understand.

"Just north of the galactic core." Shepard frowned, trying to picture the galaxy map in her head, one she'd been so familiar with on the _Normandy. _

"It's gotta be….Omega Nebula is too far north. How close to the core?" she asked.

"One of the closest systems to the core, it is more northeast…"

"Hawking Eta," Shepard confirmed. "I hope to God we're in the system with the relay." Hiul stared at her.

"God has nothing to do with it," he muttered. They moved through the unbearable green mist for the next mile or so. _They had been so close. So close! _It was hard, despite moving through never-ending mist on a foreign planet, not to dwell on their recent losses. And it was hard again, to walk beside him when only hours ago he had smashed her head into the floor of his ship, hoping to kill her. Hiul held his hand up suddenly, stopping them in their tracks. The greenish mist still hung there, omnipresent and foreboding. Her sweaty hand gripped the hilt of the knife. Something lashed out at them, screeching with hostility. Shepard was thrown back, unable to see anything for a few seconds. Several shots rung in the air, and soon silence encased them. She slowly got back up, seeing a large crab-like insect on the ground, its long pincer-tentacles splayed around. A strange liquid, probably blood, oozed from a hole in its scarlet shell. There was steam coming from Hiul's pistol. He glanced over at her.

"There will be many more. Such things are never alone." Shepard nodded.

The implication of such a planet was grim. It was inhabitable, and hadn't been colonised. What chances did they have in trying to contact anyone? She could still smell the chlorine in her helmet as they continued walking, the ground squelching beneath their feet. For numerous hours they walked, squelching through the hostile land. Hiul's feet were covered in thick sludge, and both of them had fallen waist-deep once or twice into a sulphurous pool. She was still uncomfortable without garments under her spacesuit. Somehow, she still felt hope. That Edi would find her. She tried to block the thought of Garrus from her mind. But Edi, brilliant as she was, was just one entity in a colossal galaxy. It was difficult not to feel resentment for Hiul, who had refused to let her contact the AI. The resentment surpassed the hope, as they floundered on through the green abyss.

* * *

Hiul wasn't sure how long it had been long now. Time had passed enough to tell he had walked miles, for the back of his legs began to strain, and the balls of his feet throbbed. This was unusual for him who'd always kept, like most of his species, an extremely fit physique. He tried to focus on the present moment, and forget what happened to his lost crewmembers. Yet it was difficult with little else to distract himself with. Mere primitives had destroyed his ship, a _feat_ of technology! He was the only one left. And here he was, stuck on this forsaken planet, with _her. _He tried not to look at her. For some unspecified reason seeing her face distressed him a little. His previous assault back on the ship was clear more than ever now; contusions over the eyes and cheeks marred her pale face. Yet the anger and despair he felt at his ship being destroyed made him feel like it was her fault.

He was surprised how strong she was however, stronger than he thought humans were. Back in his cycle, when they studied humans from afar, they were still developing. This human beside him was different; she was not bow-legged or shorter than five foot. She was much more lithe, with a flatter face, small nose and a higher forehead. It seemed humans had evolved greatly. Either that, or she was different to those he had studied before. Perhaps her current species had outlived the others, had forced them into extinction.

Many questions baffled him about humans and the way they'd evolved; the narrow pelvis of females, the peculiar curved spine, meandering arteries, crowded teeth and the 'inside-out' structure of the eyes. He drew himself out of his thoughts. Why _was_ he here with her, why had he even let her onto his ship? She'd been too much of a distraction, and now he was here. She was not unworthy and commanded respect, she had proved that. The insect like crabs, Klixen, had suddenly ambushed them as they travelled through a ravine. Amongst the thick cloud that hung in the air, it was challenging to see how many there were. Klixen were stronger in numbers and when they overwhelmed their enemies. He detected, predictably, their weakest spot was their face and fought off a load one at a time, but it was proving difficult.

He heard the human's grunts of exertion, as she stabbed each and every one with sheer force. Hiul turned round. There was _more! _He heard an agonised yell. Suddenly a burst of energy was flung from the core of his body, spreading through the various Klixen that had ambushed them. The pure energy he dispelled had knocked him off his own feet. He saw the Commander a few feet away, getting up and looking at him in shock. It was not faulty implants. His biotics had fully returned to him.

* * *

Hiul was glowing an eerie emerald-purple, despite the green gas that hung around them. The dozens of Klixen that had attacked them now lay dead sprawled at their feet. Hiul lifted his hands to observe the glow, highlighting his features. She saw, under the light, the thick carapace that was his head, and his brownish skin mottled with muted beige spots. She looked at him, hoping he'd explain his burst of unbelievable biotic energy. Slowly the glow faded. His eyes moved to her upper right arm, the suit ripped by one of the Klixen.

"Your arm needs attention," he said. She tried to ignore the pain and holstered her weapon.

"It's nothing. No medi gel anyway," she brushed him off, moving past him to continue walking. Despair was beginning to crush the optimism in her heart. She was never much of an optimist anyway. She kept walking, not sure if she cared whether he followed her or not. The nightmare felt worse than before. Maybe it was the planet with its noxious green fumes, with no view of a landscape, maybe it was already driving her to the brink. She heard his voice behind her.

"Commander, please, we have been walking for nearly thirty hours. We must rest. I can see a cavern just west of this ravine here."

She paused in her thoughts. Was he actually begging her? She had never heard him sound as pleading as he did in that moment. Warmth enveloped the skin on her arm where the Klixen had bitten her: the blood had seeped beneath the layer of her suit. She turned round to face him.

"Alright," she agreed.

Shepard followed Hiul towards the end of the ravine where the cavern was in sight. She had to admit he was right, although she hadn't thought of how long they'd been walking. Her limbs ached and her body was desperate for rest. The cavern was thankfully small and although damp was not congested with chlorine clouds. As the both of them found a patch that was relatively comfortable, they soon granted introspection. _From one bad planet to another. _It was possible they could die out here, and with the galaxy being in the current state it was, they could be undiscovered for years, if at all. She was uncomfortable in Hiul's presence as she thought of what he had lost, and everything that had happened between them. Before she knew it, her eyes had closed from exhaustion.

* * *

When Commander Shepard awoke, she was alone. Fear tightened her chest, her jaw clenching and nostrils flaring in panic. She scrambled about, her hands touching her helmet in panic, seeing the ceiling of the damp cavern drip on her. _What the hell is wrong with me? _Miraculously there was still air in her helmet. How much longer was it to last? The suit was prothean technology, perhaps it had unlimited filtered air. She was alone, however, and had not imagined it. She had no idea of the time and how long she had been asleep. It was doubtful that Hiul would've abandoned her, but she couldn't tell. Several minutes later, he returned.

"There is a communications relay, south of here. It is an hour journey. I did not reach it to use it, but it appears abandoned. I'd come across several klixen, but they remain the only signs of life so far. Nothing sentient." She saw something in him for the first time. He dropped to his knees in exhaustion, ignoring her enquiring stare. It was hard to read his expression, but his shoulders were hunched in despair, his head bent low. Shepard wasn't sure what to say, it was often the way between them.

"Have you rested yet?" she asked. His back was to her, and he didn't raise his head. There was a long silence.

"I'm sorry…about your loss," she said when he hadn't replied. His head shot up quickly, making her flinch. His form appeared malevolent and outlandish in the darkness of the cavern.

"I do not understand human customs, especially the 'apology'," he snapped. "It is exposing weakness." She was too tired to argue with him, and left him to stew. It can only be so much longer, she thought, lying facing the ceiling of the cavern. They needed to rest for a while longer, and then make their way to the relay. It wouldn't be long. She wondered about their last spat on the ship, about him believing she was the master AI of the Reapers. Did he still believe such a thing? Her eyes closed briefly as she drifted in and out of consciousness. When she woke half an hour later, she saw he was watching her. Shepard sat up, drowsy from her brief respite.

"How long was I out?" she asked him. He had his legs drawn up, with his forearms resting on top of his knees. It was a curiously human-like position.

"Not long," Hiul replied. "Are you strong enough to continue?"

"Why are you still mocking me?" she snapped at him. Hiul looked taken aback.

"You misunderstand my intent, human…" he said, his voice low, reverberating deep within the cavern. She frowned at him, bewildered. Shepard threw herself onto her feet, with enough energy to punch a krogan. _Hell, take a krogan down. Wrex would love me for that one. _Before she could exit the cavern, his hand caught her wrist.

"Commander," he reiterated, this time without the 'human' name-calling. From his mouth, it always seemed like a derogatory remark. She turned to look at him impatiently. The feeling of his hand on her made the hairs on the back of her neck stand. Not to mention he could read her mind when he touched her, look at her memories. She narrowed her eyes at him, watching his expression. _The bastard is looking inside my head! _Shepard wrenched her wrist out of his grip in fury. She whipped back to continue her journey out of the cavern.

"Commander, stop!" he barked. She ignored him and continued to walk towards the ominous green clouds of chlorine gas.

"Shepard!" That made her stop, if only for a second. It was the first time he'd used her name. Before she could keep going, he hastily continued.

"I was…wron-I know it was…" he faltered. Clearly he wasn't used to admitting mistakes. Credit where credit was due, he maintained eye contact with her as he stood straight. "I understand the current state of the galaxy. I know what I read was not true about you-"

"My clone that Cerberus had so _kindly_ built. Yeah, I know," she said, folding her arms.

"I don't understand you," he said, more to himself than her. "I have never met a more insubordinate, tenacious military commander-"

"Oh, you're disappointed? I set a bad example for humanity? I don't know _why_ you talk to me like you're my superior," she sneered. "I'm not gonna explain my actions, to you." It fell silent again. She could hear the steady dripping of the water from the cavern ceiling resonate loudly in the small space.

"Don't look into my head again," she warned him. He stared at her with his strange luminous eyes. For the first time she looked away, awkward under his gaze. Somehow it didn't feel right cautioning him like that.

"We need to find that comm relay," she said, turning her back on him.

He said nothing in return, and they continued their journey towards the communication relay. The journey, mercifully, was easier and they only fought off two more klixen before they reached the relay, which appeared rather new. Shepard tapped into the network, but it didn't take her long to find a signal. Hiul left her to her own devices, as he scouted the area around them for further enemies.

"Commander Shepard?" spoke a familiar voice. It was Edi. The brilliant AI had found them, at long last. _Just another routine mission. _


	13. Normandy Reunion

Shepard was ecstatic to see Joker, more than anyone else, when she boarded a familiar _Normandy_ _SR-2_. He engulfed her in a surprising bear hug. He realised what he was doing shortly afterwards and pulled away. He limped back to his usual pilot seat.

"Sorry, Commander…but, well, when Edi told me the whole story…" She smiled at him.

"It's okay, Joker. You've always had my back."

"First Saren, the geth, collectors…Now it's your clone! Never thought you'd be fighting yourself to save the galaxy huh Commander…" Fifteen years hadn't much impact on Joker; in fact he looked fitter than ever. When the _Normandy SR-2_ landed on the green planet several hours ago, Shepard was stunned beyond words. While inside most of it was still heart-wrenchingly familiar, a lot of it had been upgraded. Some of it she had recognised, although most was entirely unfamiliar. Some of it had been covered up, appearing disused. Technology always moved at an ever-swift pace. Her old captain's cabin, which was once again granted to her, now lacked the extravagant fish tank, replaced with tech she didn't understand. Thankfully it was covered up with sheets of shiny metal. The bed lacked sheets. The desk was gone, as well as all of her other possessions. There was a standard Alliance spacesuit, nothing like her old N7 armour.

What had surprised her more than anything else was the appearance of Edi: an unshackled AI. It came back to her eventually, how the AI had told her of the transition. She hadn't realised how…_good_ Edi looked. A little too good. It was feeling strenuous to try and take in the fact that fifteen years had gone by. And since Shepard had last talked to Edi, several months.

"We had to lay low for a long time," explained Joker. "Old Sheaper, Harper and Feng have this vessel tagged. If we hit anything beyond the border of the Attican Traverse its…well Reaper-in-your-face-good-ol-times…" Shepard's face must've looked confused at that point, which amused Joker. He'd missed seeing that face.

"Er, well people got creative after a while…" Edi had come up behind Shepard in the cockpit.

"The clone Shepard, the Illusive Man and Kai Leng, is what Mr Moreau means." Shepard frowned. _She still calls him that?_

"That's just…" she replied.

"Messed up, yeah, " said Joker. "Illusive Man's nickname just cracks me up. And Feng, well…Fucking Leng. He pretty much assassinated what was the rest of the Alliance…The top brass n' all that."

"Not…Hackett, Anderson? The Alliance?" whispered Shepard. Edi and Joker had exchanged glances. Shepard frowned deeply. _How long before I collapse?_

"Why is the Illusive Man called Harper?" she asked quickly.

"Jack Harper is his real name," replied Edi, who was looking closely at Shepard. "Commander, did you want to go to the medway?" Shepard waved Edi away.

"I've just gotta rest…I'm fine…" She didn't say anything further before retreating back to her cabin. Everything was too fresh and painful to process. Sleep was granted to her quickly.

* * *

Shepard slept for over eight hours, which was unusual for her. A knock on the door, something as old as time, was what woke her up. She mumbled 'enter' before groggily rising from the bed, which still was without a sheet and duvet. She expected it to be anyone but Liara T-Soni. Liara, who looked she hadn't aged a day, stood in front of her in her usual white suit, although it was slightly dirtier than before. Her large blue eyes drank in the sight of her old friend and Commander. What she saw shocked her; Shepard was no longer the tough, strong heroine she'd always admired. A thin, world-weary woman sat in front of her. Her face was bruised, her limbs were gaunt and stuck through the dirty spacesuit. Normally tall, Shepard seemed to have shrunk in her weight loss, and her dark hair was much longer and lankier. Liara, whose expressions always mirrored her feelings well, couldn't help but whisper Shepard's name in despair. Liara noticed Shepard had slept on a sheetless bed, and sat herself down beside the Commander. She could hear her shallow breathing. Up close, Liara saw in Shepard's deep amber eyes traces of the person whom she knew.

"Everything's gone to shit," whispered Shepard. Liara stared at her in shock. She'd never heard the Commander speak in such a negative tone before. It was so strange to see the real Shepard, after these fifteen years.

"Tell me everything Shepard. If you're comfortable," she said. It took a while for Shepard to tell Liara everything. The asari nodded the whole through, her large blue eyes drinking in Shepard's thinned appearance. By the end, Liara held her hand.

"I can't believe it's been fifteen years," Shepard said. "I can't even wrap my head around it. You haven't changed." Liara smiled weakly at her.

"Fifteen years is like a mere month to me."

Liara was patient as Shepard told her the whole story, but grew restless halfway through. She didn't want to be reminded of the inane details, especially not of her interrogation.

"It was prothean tech that I used to contact Garrus, buried under the buildings these people erected."

"If our prothean guest said a Reaper artefact was placed on the planet years ago, it is likely these people were indoctrinated. If only slightly," said Liara.

After their conversation Edi ran a medical diagnostic on her, saying all she needed was to gain a little more weight. Her arm had fully healed by now, even though Edi had detected she was missing her omni tool implant, and would have to go to the nearest Polaris manufacturer to get it refitted. No one else had probed her with questions; Edi seemed to sense Shepard's emotional turmoil, as did Liara. As for the unexpected guest, Hiul made his quarters in engineering. Strangely enough, he settled himself where Jack had been.

After a couple of days, which they spent in space recuperating, Edi told her that she she'd been unable to contact Garrus since they last spoke. A few months between Shepard's escape and arrival on the Normandy several months had passed. The last she heard was that Garrus was in the Terminus Systems. Apparently it was still part of the galaxy, which the Shepard AI clone and its Reapers hadn't fully dominated. A small wisp of hope, whatever it was, settled in her heart.

* * *

The brief recuperation allowed Shepard time with her old crew. Luckily they had gathered supplies while they waited for her arrival beforehand. While it had only been a month and a half for her, it had been over fifteen years for them. They were clustered round the old galley tables on the crew deck. Shepard had found a spare set of plain clothes in the wardrobe in her old room. There was no armour. Her old N7 armour still resided on Aegeus, charred and lost to the sands of time. Much to her surprise, she dug out an old N7 hoodie of hers. It had been carefully folded, as if preserved for her return. When she pressed it to her nose, she could smell fish food.

Turns out an age-old bottle of fish food was in the drawer along with her hoodie. Hiul as usual was not in the room. He'd made sure their presence was abhorrent to him. Liara and Joker were sat round the table with her, warm drinks in their hands. Apparently Joker had been doing a lot of the cooking, seeing himself as somewhat of an expert. This was something she hadn't known about the helmsman. She found out a lot of things. Zaaed, Samara and Jacob had definitely been killed in the shuttle explosion on Aegeus. Clone Shepard had begun merging many people with cybernetics. That their crew had been split up and they hadn't heard from anyone in years. Joker and Edi in her new body were in a relationship and had been for the last fifteen years.

"Liara I thought you'd be…well...all over the prothean, Hi-" Joker began.

"You make it sound so...er.." said Liara, trailing off, making Joker chuckle. Shepard smirked. She was glad to see that Joker's humour hadn't faded, and that Liara was still her old at-times socially inept self.

"We went to Eden Prime shortly before the Sheaper thing happened. We uncovered another Prothean, so she had her chance…began Liara again.

"That's…unbelievable. Another Prothean?" said Shepard.

"Well at least Hull? Hooll? Hu-elle?"

"_Hiul_," Shepard corrected Joker. "Hew-ull."

"Well at least he's more…. Let's just say with Javik it was 'primitive this' and 'primitive that.'"

"What happened to him?" asked Shepard. There was a stiff silence, like charged static in the air waiting to be expelled.

"We don't know," replied Liara eventually. Her face was solemn. "After the catalyst-clone-Shepard events, we were separated. From a lot of the crew. We haven't heard anything. He could be dead."

"Come on, Liara, he'd say something like 'these primitives'-"

"Stop it, Joker, it's not funny," snapped Liara. There was another silence. Despite the familiarity of her ship, so much had changed she couldn't feel at home. It smelt different. It hummed differently. It lost its streamlined interior. Everything had been patched up with old and new technology.

"You think Hiul will appreciate being called 'Prothy the Prothean?'" said Joker. Liara sighed. Shepard smiled slowly at him. She had left the two of them to chat away, exploring the crew deck, thinking of all the faces she'd encountered in each room. By the time she approached their table, both Liara and Joker were still there, talking in hushed whispers. She stayed behind the wall where the elevator was, straining to hear what they were saying.

"I thought _you_ fancied him-"

"Joker, just because my research is based on protheans doesn't mean-"

"Alright, alright, cool your hair…er, head tails? I know you fancy your own research." There was, yet again, a brief pause.

"I think he likes Shepard," said Joker. Shepard scowled, leaning forward to strain her hearing further. "I mean he's totally her type. Fifty thousand years old and still good looking. She's dated different species before. Got the hots for-"

"You can't be _serious_, Joker," said Liara.

"Okay, yeah. Maybe exaggerating. But I get the feeling they had a 'thing' you know, back on Aegeus…"

"There's definite tension between them. I just can't believe how bad she looked when I saw her. How did she get that bruising on her face? I know she hasn't told us everything." It felt awkward to hear this private conversation. She thought Hiul _despised_ her. Every particle. She hated him. It was ridiculous. He made sure that his dislike for her was evident.

"He's hardly said a word to us when he came in, apart from her."

"But does that mean he _likes_ her?" There was yet again, another pause.

"There's too much hostility between them. He's so different from Javik," replied Liara.

Shepard turned away, wishing she hadn't heard it.

* * *

Things had to go on. Shepard couldn't avoid Hiul forever, either. _And_ they had to formulate a plan, which involved him directly. Liara, Edi and Joker all seemed to think it was best for her to go and talk to him. With reluctance, Shepard climbed down the familiar stairs to the engine deck, and further into the space where Jack used to reside. Hiul was sat in what reminded her of a lotus position, expelling a tiny biotic field between his hands. It looked like he was meditating. She thought she'd have to awkwardly break his deep concentration, but he seemed to detect her instantly. He stood up.

"Commander," he said. Was he going to salute her? Shepard glanced around the tiny space. Large metal crates that looked worn filled the space, making it smaller than she remembered. It was a dumping ground for old technology. The galaxy wasn't the same, she thought. The Alliance is no more. Anderson is gone. _I should technically be dead._

"I need you to accompany me on a small mission," she said, standing straight with her arms behind her back. _You still stand like a solider. This isn't an Alliance ship anymore, and these people aren't your crew._ He regarded her without words, but tilted his head slightly. She felt an itch crawl over her skin in discomfort.

"I'm not your Commander. I'm not a 'Commander' anymore. This ship is no longer part-"

"Then why are you _commanding_ me, human?" Shepard felt her temper being pricked.

"Why must you always call me 'human'? Is it uncomfortable for you to call me by my name?"

"You have three names, which do you prefer? Human is what you are. Or are you ashamed by the fact you are a human?"

"You're unbelievable," she muttered under her breath. He began pacing in front of her. She was well aware his temper was also rising, or at least being provoked.

"You do realise that I have no choice but to stay with you and your crew for the time being," he spat. "That I have nothing else?"

"Because your crew is dead?" He stopped pacing and stared hard at her, his fists clenched. When he was angry, he was very easy to read. This was what made her doubt Joker's words about him liking her. It was ludicrous.

"If you wish to emotionally provoke me with spoken language then I am afraid you will fail," he said. "Protheans do not 'feel' as humans do." He's lying, she thought.

"I'm stating the truth. I'm sorry it happened-"

"Enough!" he bellowed. "I will oblige you. I will do whatever you need, Shepard. But I will not stay here for long." She turned away from him, stomping up the stairs back to the elevator, trying hard not to let whatever in her explode.

* * *

"Commander," began Edi, as Shepard was suiting up in her cabin. The AI apparently decided it was perfectly fine to intrude in on her private quarters.

"It's not 'Commander' anymore, Edi. Just Shepard." The AI moved closer to Shepard, trying to discern Shepard's emotions through a simple scan.

"I would advise that it is extremely unwise to provoke the prothean." Shepard was slipping on her boots, taking time with strapping them on. Her head was bent over towards the ground, her dark hair flopping into her face. She didn't want Edi to look at her.

"Already happened," she mumbled. Later, when Shepard and Hiul were equipped with the right gear, Edi went through the plan with them. They had to find Garrus. They had to get a team back together. Their first stop was a fuel depot in the Terminus Systems, a system that was mostly untouched by Reaper domination. Unfortunately, the crime in that part of the galaxy was more rampant than it'd been before.

When they arrived, Shepard and Hiul walked towards the foyer of the large fuel depot, one of the largest in the area. The _Normandy_ was behind them, hooked up. A batarian was lazily slumped against the fuel tank, holding the large cylinder lead in his hand as the machine pumped noisily. Shepard held up her fist, signalling Hiul behind her to halt. The two assistants by the reception desk were talking loudly. She caught the word 'Archangel.' She angled her head ever so slightly. One a human, the other a turian. The human's accent belonged to the nearest colony. The place was poorly kept after. It stank of machinery and previous burning heat from ship engines. The walls were covered with slimy grime.

"…he's down 'ere, every goddamn week, demanding this and that of me. I can only smuggle so much in. It's 'ard when we're always under surveillance…At least Sheaper and 'er cronies ain't running the show. Not yet anyways."

"I hear he's getting some team together, with some other human," said another voice, one with a distinctive flanging tone of a turian. "Working on a plan to assassinate Sheaper's XO."

"What? You gotta be kiddin' me, _Leng_? He's nearly beyond human. Merged with them cybernetics." Shepard was very still for a moment. She could feel Hiul's stare on her back. Ignoring Edi's earlier advice, she plunged straight into the reception area. The turian looked up quickly.

"Hey! You need a licence if you're offering to sell, but if you're buying, back of the line-" Shepard whipped out her heavy pistol and pointed it at his scaled head.

"I would tell me where this Archangel went. And I'd do it _quickly_," she said. She could feel Hiul behind her. It seemed she was living up to his words – she was reckless. Perhaps brutal, at times. The turian's mandibles open in a way that looked like a smirk to her. She cocked the pistol in anger.

"Hey lady, we don' want no trouble," said the other employee, a human. "We're a peaceful company. If you want trouble, well I've got six gunmen out the back with each n' every weapon trained on your sorry ass."

Shepard smirks at him. "And I've got a ship with stealth technology, thanix cannons and a tantalus drive core." The man burst out laughing. For some reason, heat prickled at the back of her neck. Her finger nearly pulled the trigger.

"Are you kiddin' me? Those went outta date years ago. We're not fuckin' idiots," he sneered. Having faltered ever so slightly, the turian next to her knocked the pistol out of her grip. It slid across the floor, out of her reach. Shepard quickly pulled out a knife and plunged it straight into the shoulder of the turian. As he bellowed in pain, she flung another smaller knife into the man's chest before he could press the security button. Shepard slamed the turian down onto the desk in front of her. Even incapacitated, overcoming a turian was no easy game for physically humans were inferior. The man fell to the ground awkwardly, catching his head hard on the floor.

"I've just about had it," she hissed into the turian's face, near his hidden ear. "I've been dead for fifteen years and I'm not gonna let _pricks_ like you-" She felt Hiul grab her arm tightly.

"Get this bitch offa me!" bellowed the turian. Shepard met Hiul's peculiar yellow eyes. She'd never noticed until now that he had two pupils. She pulled away.

"Get the knife out," began the turian again, straightening himself back up.

"When I remove the implement you will likely haemorrhage severely so medical attention-"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, save it four eyes!" Hiul slammed him back onto the desk in response.

"Do you want to suffer a fate like your colleague?"

"Check the terminal," moaned the turian in response, barely pointing at the inbuilt desk terminal, with a glowing orange screen. Hiul took the turian by the upper arm, with unanticipated strength and hauled him over to the terminal.

"Tracking coordinates for Archangel's ship, we've been smuggling stuff in for him, but he's failing to hold up his hand of the bargain so-" Hiul, having instantly memorised the numbers, interrupted the turian.

"I am deleting the coordinates," he stated. A gargle was heard from the floor at the other end of the desk. The human stumbled upwards, the small knife still imbedded in his chest.

"What no, you don't understand, we work for these mercs, they'll kill us-" protested the turian.

"Deleted." They walk back to the airlock, after turning away from them. Shepard could faintly hear the wounded man yell obscenities.

"_Fuck you! Fuck your bitch…you scum alien! Fuck!_"

She almost didn't know herself anymore.


	14. Garrus

'Archangel' as Garrus Vakarian deemed himself again, was on a station that appeared very similar to Omega, in the Terminus systems. The coordinates, thankfully provided by Edi, were exactly the same as the old Omega's coordinates. Shepard frowned deeply as they looked at the galaxy map in the CIC.

"Omega 2?" she asked, frowning at the map in front of them, her eyebrows raised. Liara jumped in before Edi could.

"A rather uninspiring, uncreative renaming of the original," she said.

"That's not the official name though, just a running joke among mercs," filled in Joker from the cockpit.

"What happened to the other Omega, though?" questioned Shepard. She saw that Liara eyed Edi hesitantly.

"It's the same thing," Liara replied. This drew a perplexed look from Shepard.

"A small war ensued between Cerberus and the mercs controlled by Aria T'Loak," filled in Edi.

"It was gonna happen at some point!" Joker called over again.

"It was long and bloody. Cerberus was nearly defeated, but large parts of the station was badly damaged," finished Liara. She looked as if braced for an angry outburst from the Commander. Shepard glanced down at her tight fists clutching the railing above the map.

"Aria T'Loak, however, re-took Omega. Half of it has been updated with new technology - so it doesn't match up with what the rest looks like."

"Unsurprising," came a voice behind them. They all whipped around, as if they hadn't heard the elevator open and soft steps echo from behind. Liara's eyes narrowed at Hiul, who stood there in all his six-foot-five glory, hands behind his back. He looked like a military commander about to address them. Shepard didn't turn around to face him, trying to keep her eyes on the map.

"From what I have gathered, Cerberus, or the 'Illusive Man', had been skilfully manipulating you from the start," Hiul said, as he walked around the edge of the map, so he came into Shepard's view. She cringed, only slightly. "Setting up sympathetic faces on this ship to prevent you from seeing the real Cerberus…. It is rather impressive seeing such remarkable manipulation skills for a mere human."

Liara glanced at Shepard, recognising a familiar look, one of rage. She could see the commander was barely holding it together, as she had been earlier. Had they fought before? Was that why she had horrible bruising all over her face?

"Humans have greatly evolved since you last observed them some fifty thousand years ago," said Edi. It was just the right time. "It may be said that some of the humans you had been observing were Neanderthals, who were a human subspecies-"

"Why do you have a fully sentient AI aboard your ship? In a separate body?" Hiul cut through Edi, staring at her. It was the first time he'd seen her, as he'd spent the entire time down in engineering.

"I'm not explaining this again," said Liara, rubbing her hand over her face tiredly. "We clarified it with the last prothean who wasn't-"

"The last prothean? You know of another?" Liara stared at Hiul for what seemed a long time before answering.

"Yes…but, after Sheap….after Shepard's clone became the master AI of the Reapers, everything fell apart. Our crew had been separated. We haven't had any news of Javik," said Liara. Hiul didn't look as if he recognised the name, but it was a long shot. Hiul seemed to take in this information, and headed slowly towards the cockpit. He almost appeared melancholy as he gazed at the ground, seemingly lost in thought. Shepard then ignored him.

"We have a plan?" she asked Liara, coming down from the map's overlooking steps. Liara was still preoccupied with looking over at Hiul, who was now examining the corridor towards the cockpit.

"Shepard…" she began. Shepard nearly smiled, a tone of Liara's that was so familiar.

"I don't wanna hear it," Shepard cut her off. "I heard what you and Joker were talking about. He's an arrogant bastard, we don't see eye to eye-"

"As you can be," Liara said, her voice quietly soft. Shepard angrily pulled away, trying to dispel the despair she felt in her heart, her back turned towards Liara. She hadn't felt despair like this since Mindoir. She hadn't noticed that Edi had approached them, from the other side of the room.

"Shepard, my scans indicate that your blood pressure is abnormally-" Since when did Edi become her mother? All she'd been doing for the past few days was badgering her about her arm, her malnutrition...She was tough. She could handle this.

"When are we setting plans in place?" Shepard snapped. "If we don't get to Omega soon, Garrus will already have moved off. Sounds like he doesn't stay in places for that long, especially if he's being tailed." Liara looked at her with her impossibly blue eyes, wide like rock pools.

"I think you need to recover first…Garrus is…" she trailed off, helpless with only Edi to back her up. Unfortunately Edi was not subtle, despite being in the physical and emotional presence of humans for over fifteen years.

"Garrus Vakarian is still under the impression that there is only one Shepard. Whatever he heard of you on Aegeus he thinks is a false transmission in order to emotionally manipulate him. It's happened many times before - with all of us. Sheaper wants us all dead. Garrus will have a hard time adjusting to the fact that the Shepard who betrayed him is in fact a clone. He might even not believe that you are in fact the real Shepard." Thanks, Edi. Real dose of confidence there.

Shepard was quiet for a mere moment before marching towards the armoury.

"We get ready. Not one more minute," she called back over her shoulder. If this was how it was going to be, she'd deal with it. She was sick of feeling this sense of helplessness. Time to cut the bullshit for real.

* * *

Shepard ditched the heavy Alliance armour and went for something a little lighter. Alliance armour was out of date and she needed to move without lugging unnecessary weight around. So underneath a jumpsuit with upgraded microfiber wave she applied light chest and leg armour. She weaved a heavy scarf around her neck, in case she needed to cover her head. The goal was not to draw overt attention to themselves. The Normandy managed to dock at one of the many ports at the station with its stealth technology activated. Edi, brilliantly as usual, hacked the terminal above the port, changing its status to 'not in use.' While her face wouldn't be remembered or recognised by many species in the galaxy, Shepard knew despite this many would remember her. And she doubted anyone was going to let the so-called dominator of the universe stroll around Omega as if nothing was wrong. As they assembled by the airlock, Shepard faced her crew.

"Shepard, I have information about Omega-2 if-" Edi began.

"If it's anything like the last Omega then I don't want to hear it," Shepard cut the AI off.

"I'd say it is, then," said Joker, standing stooped beside Edi. Fortunately no one knew about Edi's unshackling, although she used a body that used to belong to a Cerberus agent.

"I have applied the same technology that is used for the activating Normandy's stealth shield," explained Edi several beforehand. She had given them earpieces so they could communicate with her. Within an instant, Edi had disappeared from in front of Shepard's view. She had to admit Edi impressed her now more than she'd ever done before; although it was only because Edi was no longer a slave to Cerberus. When they boarded the station, Shepard felt astounded. It looked nothing like the previous Omega, with its white silvery streamlined walls. Everything was clean and bright.

"It's nothing like the old parts of Omega," she said to Liara who walked beside her.

"I think Joker meant other similarities, other than appearance," Liara said. "Fortunately we are in the newly-built part of the station."

"It smells…highly unusual," said a familiar voice behind them. Joker had remained on the ship, of course. Shepard stiffened as she turned to face Hiul.

"So you've decided to grace us with your presence?" she snapped.

"Shep," said Liara, warning in her voice. Hiul walked towards them.

"Yes, although there is nothing graceful about it," he said. Shepard said nothing for a moment, somewhat perplexed with his somewhat sardonic response, which had been confused by her phrasing. Liara supressed a small smile.

"Well you're in luck, this is a station where you can catch the next flight to Andromeda," Shepard said.

"I was aware that humans, among other species, had not yet travelled to 'Andromeda' as you name it." Shepard turned back round, not bothering to give him a response, which he'd only counter with something cutting. Despite the cleanliness of the place, Omega-2's layout was similar to that of its predecessor. When they walked out of the docking station they were greeted by another nightclub, reminding Shepard of the one that Aria T-Loak previously used as a base.

"I have become aware that we are not dressed for an occasion," spoke Edi in Shepard's ear. Had she caught me staring at that nightclub? Two burly looking bouncers, both batarian, stood at the door, enjoying their jobs. She saw they turned whomever they didn't deem 'suitable' enough away.

"If you're asking about casual attire, then I have nothing of the sort, Edi," replied Shepard, her teeth gritted. She didn't even beforehand. Her version of 'night out attire' was black jeans and a t-shirt. "I walked into Afterlife in my full armour, no one batted a single eyelid. Or whatever version of an eyelid…" Liara turned to Shepard.

"I don't know if this is a good idea. We'll look conspicuous. Not to mention the prothean…" Hiul had decided to stop several metres behind them staring at a homeless batarian on the ground, against a white wall.

"We got any leads, other than he was seen at this station?"

"Nothing. Garrus could've left by now. He's avoiding everyone," said Liara. There was the smell of spice in the air and Shepard could hear the distant booming of club music to her right.

"Maybe ask Hiul to hang back with Joker," said Shepard. "He'll have a whale of a time." Liara gave her a look, before turning back towards Hiul. Shepard looked over towards the front of the club. The name of this club was Sin City, which blazed neon blue against the chrome of the outside building. A youngish looking guy was slumped over, being sick onto the stark floor beneath him. It was a lot busier than she remembered before. Crowds of people passed by her, mostly turian, batarian and human. She was surprised to see so many batarians around, having thought that perhaps they would perish from Reaper domination. A krogan knocked her sideways. She'd been too busy staring at the scenery around her.

"Watch it, smooth skin," he growled at her. She said nothing, knowing whatever her response he'd find an excuse to crush her bones in one. She was surprised to see a krogan. Liara found them eventually, bringing her thoughts away.

"He said he'd stand guard, just outside the club," Liara said, out of breath from having to fight her way through the barrage of people. Shepard nodded and without further adieu they walked towards the front of the club. The batarian held out a gloved hand.

"Members pass?" he said.

"Do I look like a member to you?" replied Shepard, crossing her arms.

"No we don't," cut in Liara.

"Then the entry fee is a thousand credits for two of you."

"Higher fees 'cos I'm a human? You've gotta be joking-"

"Here," said Liara, holding her arm out where her omni tool flashed on. The batarian waited for a moment for the transaction on his omni tool to complete and waved them in.

"Don't ask," muttered Liara as they walked in.

The heavily synthesised music that played made the blood in Shepard's ears pound. Compared to the stark brightness of the station outside, the club was dark and seedy. Its contents were not unlike its previous counterpart with the staged dancers, the various bars and booths with cosied-up couples and gangs sharing a drink. Shepard glanced briefly up at the dancers, some of them human. How badly had humans fared amongst all this? She hadn't asked about Earth. What happened to it? Was it fine under Sheaper's domination? Or had she allowed the Reapers to destroy it?

"Drink, Shepard?" Liara said, taking Shepard's elbow.

"You know its probably not a good idea to call me that in public," hissed Shepard as they weaved through sweaty crowds towards the turian-manned bar.

"Hmm, excellent idea. Although I don't know you by any other name…"

"Er…Kathryn…" mumbled Shepard. Her eyes were too busy scanning the area for Garrus.

"Not sure I can get used to that," said Liara, after ordering them a couple of non-alcoholic drinks. "You don't seem like a Kathryn…. A human name like Zoe or Saskia is what I'd expected."

"It's my first name. I never liked it either," she said. Her parents were so traditional she'd probably been named after a great-grandmother or great aunt.

"What about Kat?" Liara asked, glancing around at the scenery.

"Never a Kat. I was a Kate to my school friends." Liara smiled at her.

"I like Kate." Shepard glanced down at the pink liquid in her glass.

"What in the hell is this?" she said.

"Something that's not alcohol."

"I might be needing alcohol…" She took a sip nonetheless and immediately winced.

"Do all drinks taste like this now?" It was too sweet for her liking. They stood there for a while at the bar, pretending to look relaxed. Liara did most of the talking, about her time spent with Edi and Joker. Shepard couldn't help but feel the press of her hand cannon against her hip, disguised by a jacket she wore over her light armour. Amongst all the various humans, turians, batarians that passed them by, Shepard was unaware of the woman who approached them slowly out of the blue. Unbeknownst to them she had been watching from afar their movements for the past ten minutes. She walked straight up to the bar on Liara's side, confidently ordering something that Shepard, in clear earshot hadn't even heard of.

"Tried the Splitter yet?" the woman asked Liara.

"Er, not really," said Liara.

"Darn it, you're the most beautiful asari I've ever seen," the woman exclaimed, turning round fully to face them both. Shepard raised an eyebrow, looking the woman up and down. Dyed red hair spilled over one shoulder. She was not wearing the usual-clubbing getup. Although in fifteen years who knew what the fashions were now, not that she ever paid attention.

"Thank…you," said Liara, unfazed.

"I love this place, its just so…" the woman swivelled her head around the place, taking it all in. "So…funky!" Shepard wasn't sure whether the woman possessed either an overbearing sexual allure, with a jumpsuit that left little to the imagination, or an over-excited chirpy charisma. Well, she thought, more like an irritating parrot. Whatever it was, it made her feel uncomfortable anyhow.

"So are you from around here?" the woman said. Shepard had been staring at the woman too hard. Liara dug the feel of her boot into Shepard's toes.

"Um, er…Not really…" she said. _Christ_, years spent in the Alliance had afforded her the debt of social awkwardness.

"Ah…you did look a little lost I have to say." Shepard's irritation, a sensitive thing, began to rise.

"So where you hail from originally? Earth or colony?" the woman asked. Obviously she wasn't going to tell this woman the truth. Even if she wasn't suspect telling people she was from Mindoir invited others to ask her about her tale of survival. It was tiresome.

"So are you with anyone here?" asked Liara. The woman sipped her drink through a straw rather tantalisingly. There was a glow in her dark eyes that reminded Shepard of the glow people tended to have when they were indoctrinated. Like the eyes of Dr Amanda Kenson, before she was incapacitated, back on the 'Project Base' asteroid. The woman smiled thinly.

"Just the one. A turian." Shepard narrowed her eyes as she stared at the woman. She suddenly remembered what the fuel depot turian had been talking about. They were going to assassinate clone Shepard's XO. Yet somehow, this woman didn't feel like the right candidate for Garrus to team up with.

"Did you loose him?" Shepard tried to ask with a smile.

"No, he's just talking with some friends out the back," replied the woman, with an equally false smile. I wonder if it's him, Shepard thought. Liara seemed to sense something, and excused herself. Shepard would have to make do with making conversation.

"That sure is a nasty bruise on your face…" The woman said, leaning in slightly. Shepard had never been spoken to like this before. It was as if the woman was deliberately trying to provoke her. She couldn't help but step back slightly. The woman smiled knowingly at her.

"I bet you've got some tale to tell…let me guess, you're a pirate queen, head of your own ship, scouting the galaxy…"

"Actually, I look at the ship engines most of the time. Getting my hands dirty."

"Ah, an engineer…

"Shepard," spoke Edi in her ear. "We've located Garrus Vakarian round the back of the nightclub. He is currently with Blue Suns mercenaries. They no longer wear blue armour as they used to, so I am not entirely clear. I managed to get close to them in order to hear their conversation. He is making a deal with them in order to obtain a particular kind of weapon." Garrus? Making _deals_ with the Blue Suns? Those mercs that he so fearlessly and justly fought off when he was 'Archangel' on Omega all that time ago? When she was still under Cerberus's knife? Perhaps this was the weapon that would help him defeat clone Shepard and her crew. She knew he'd go that far to do it himself, with added help of course. He was that moralistic. But this was different – he was still unaware of the truth. She wondered if his motivation was vengeance.

"…although he never really enjoyed it…"

"Um, yeah," said Shepard, realising that the woman had been talking the entire time.

"Were you even listening?" said the woman.

"Shepard, he is approaching-" Edi's voice was cut off abruptly. The earpiece crackled and fizzed in her ear, so loudly that Shepard dropped her drink, startled. The sticky pink mess was on her boots. The woman stared at the mess on the floor before looking up and waving to someone through the large crowd. No one took any notice of the smashed glass on the floor.

"Here comes my friend," the woman said. Within that moment, the scene before Shepard seemed to dissolve and mutate in front of her. Her head felt light. The blood pounded like a drum in her inner ears. A turian in substantially powerful armour, more high tech than she'd seen before, walked towards the woman. He put a clawed hand on her waist.

"Hey. It's done," he said. The woman glanced over at Shepard. Shepard stared at Garrus, her tongue dry and fat like a sponge in her mouth.

"Oh, I've been so rude, Garrus. This is – er, I never caught your name? My name's Sania."

"Shepard." Both her and Garrus had spoken in unison. Time seemed to stop as they locked eyes.

"Shepard, we are waiting outside," said Edi's voice in her ear.

"You know each other?" Sania said, raising an eyebrow. Garrus's piercing hawk-like eyes, blue and steady, regarded her.

"Once," he said. There was barely held contempt in his voice. She swallowed, her hands visibly shaking.

"Garrus, I…the others are outside. Waiting. Liara and Edi. I don't expect you to-"

"Why should I believe you?" he snarled. "It's happened before and it'll happen again."

"You don't need to believe me," Shepard answered simply. Her heart was pounding underneath her chest armour.

"I knew I shouldn't have been so stupid to come here," he said to Sania. Sania rounded on Shepard.

"You're not the Shepard, are you?" she said, accusation clear in her voice.

"I'm not talking to you," Shepard said to Sania before turning back to Garrus. "Garrus if you care about the fate of the galaxy you need to come with me. If you care at all about your real friends-" Sania cut her off abruptly, putting a firm hand on her chest.

"I think I know where this is going. You either get out, or I'll call security."

"Security? On Omega?" Shepard sneered.

"This ends here," Garrus snapped. "I won't be manipulated by you, again." He drew himself up to his full height and stepped in front of Shepard. She had to crane her head slightly to look at him. There was a tiny fear that resided in her. A turian wouldn't hesitate like a human might.

"I'm here, Garrus, in the flesh. How could Sheaper possibly be here? In this club?" she pleaded. "Can't you see what's happened? Cerberus created a clone of me…she was the one that betrayed everyone. Took my life from me. Left me on a planet that stranded me - a dwarf planet close to the galaxy core. I was stranded for fifteen years by gravitational time dilation-"

"Enough!" Sania said. "You're an agent of Sheaper's, we know what you're doing!"

Sania pulled out a weapon before Shepard realised what she was doing. Hiul, out of nowhere, in an instant had a weapon pointed at Sania's temple. He looked over at Garrus.

"I suggest you come with us," he said. Sudden approval flared in her, briefly forgetting her dislike. Liara walked slowly over to Hiul, looking at Garrus. Garrus's turian features morphed into one that resembled shock.

"Liara? I thought-"

"Edi and Joker too. Give us a chance, Garrus," Liara said, her voice soft. Garrus hesitated, looking at Sania. He gave a silent nod of approval, his features softening.

* * *

The walk back to the _Normandy_ after the confrontation was steeped in silence. When they boarded, Garrus took his time wandering the ship. He refused offers of dinner, and went down to the gun battery, his usual spot. Later he returned to the mess hall where they all gathered round the table. For several hours, they all caught up, although Garrus paid no attention to Shepard. It pained her more than she liked to admit. He seemed to lack something, he hardly spoke and didn't respond to Joker's humour. She found out that he had been travelling with Sania for quite a while, evading capture from Sheaper's authorities. He'd stolen an Alliance cruiser that Sheaper had in her possession, named the Chatteris. Garrus asked about Edi, about Liara, and Joker managed to get a sarcastic witticism in here and there. One that was appropriate, of course. Shepard was uncomfortable, and mostly silent throughout the conversation.

"What's with the other guy?" asked Sania. The _Normandy_ still adhered to Earth time, and it was late at night.

"The prothean?" said Liara.

"I thought we'd uncovered only one prothean, Javik," said Garrus. Hiul hadn't been present for the entire conversation.

"If you're willing to hear the entire story, Garrus, the truth, well I'm more than willing to tell it now," said Shepard, ice in her voice.

"That won't be necessary," said Sania. "I'm sure it can wait until the morning." Shepard stood up quickly and left the room. She already harboured an intense dislike for Sania, although she wasn't sure if she cared enough for it to be classed as a dislike. She needed a shower to cool off. The rest of them, apart from Joker, remained in the CIC. She took the elevator back up to her lonely cabin. She wanted to cry, or punch a wall, or expel some sort of emotion that would satisfy her internally. But that was for others. She knew she was different. She sat on her bed, still comfy as ever. She ended up taking a long shower, relishing the cool water on her skin. For some reason her knuckles on her left hand were badly scuffed. The basin was bloodied slightly as she re-opened a cut on her knuckle as she cleaned it, after showering. Perhaps it was best to get an early night, she mused, despite her still wet hair. The sheets of the bed looked so inviting. Suddenly her terminal on the desk bleeped, indicating there was a presence. Hoping it wasn't Liara, hoping to cajole her into talking about her feelings, she walked towards the door. There resided a small hope inside her. Please, let it be him. The doors opened. Four yellow eyes stared back at her. Great.

"Hiul," she said, somewhat surprised. "What could bring you to my door this late?"

"I do not follow the 'Earth' time as you call it," he said.

"Well I'm about to sleep, actually." She turned away, grabbing her N7 hoodie that was on the back of the desk chair. She felt knackered. Hiul was busy looking around at her large cabin. She heard him mutter something about the misuse of space.

"What is wrong with your…" he began behind her. Frowning, she turned back round to face him, perplexed. He gestured towards her head with his hand.

"My hair? It's wet…" she said. She'd forgotten about that.

"How unusual. I do not understand human evolution…"

"Look, I'm beat. Say whatever you're going to say and be done with it." It felt like he was stalling for time, uncomfortable with what he was going to tell her.

"I have…decided that it would be best for me to stay aboard this vessel." She raised an eyebrow at him.

"What's with the formality?" she said, running a hand through her wet hair.

"That is not the only thing," he said. He approached her, as she stood by the bed, willing it to swallow her up. He came far enough so that he was right in front of her.

"It is that human who arrived with the turian," he continued. Her interest was piqued.

"You know something about her?" she asked.

"No, but I sense something. That she is not whom she claims to be." She crossed her arms irritably.

"That's hardly enough to go on," she replied. "I don't trust her either."

"I don't trust the both of them. You shouldn't have let them on the ship," was all he replied, walking back towards her door and exiting. He had told her what she already knew. She returned to the bed, climbing under the sheets. She looked at the starry sky through the skylight above her as she lay there, and thought of the turian on board. It was so tempting to walk down to the main battery, just like before. How she'd mercilessly flirt and tease him. She loved his awkward, slightly abashed behaviour, trying his best to be romantic. No one had ever tried to be romantic with her before - perhaps Kaidan had tried to. But that had gone no where, and inevitably she knew she'd probably lead him on a bit.

Was Garrus in a relationship Sania? Had they...done it? She knew she would drive herself crazy with it, not bearing to think of them naked and entwined. Why would it even bother her? It was just casual sex they had, to work off stress. It seemed she cared more than she liked to admit. And that perhaps, her heart felt like it had been broken for the first time.


	15. Shepard's Pain

She woke up many hours later, propelled from her pillow by an unusual dream. For some reason she had dreamt about Ashley Williams, who had died all those years ago on Virmire. She didn't normally dream, and she'd never dreamt about Ashley before. Why had it come to her now? Every night since Aegeus she had a vivid dream, seemingly calling up the most traumatic events in her life.

"Commander," said Edi's voice. Shepard sat up, sleepy and ruffled from her bad night's sleep.

"Everyone has gathered in the briefing room on the CIC deck." Shepard walked groggily to the bathroom to splash water on her face, Ashley's face still with her.

"I wish you'd stop treating me like the Commander, Edi," she grumbled while burying her face with her hands in cool, refreshing water.

"But you are the Commander," persisted Edi. "We need you here to discuss infiltrating Sheaper's base." That pricked her ears up. How in the hell did they know where it was?

"Right away then," she added. Changing back into her hoodie, Shepard arrived at the comm room where everyone on board was stood. Liara looked at her enquiringly as she shuffled in, but Shepard avoided her gaze. She also desperately tried to avoid the eyes of Garrus, who was stood unsurprisingly close to Sania. Hiul much to her surprise was also present, sat at the table. The table hadn't seemed to maintain its shininess that once covered it years before. Everything about the Normandy seemed worn, taken apart and re-used. It seemed high-tech was few and far between and that people tended to recycle and re-use their pieces of technology rather than opt for the brand new one. It gave a more homely feeling, Shepard supposed, but it was unfamiliar and sparked a terrible ache in her chest. She wanted it to be goddamn normal again. It was still difficult to get used to the fact that fifteen years had gone by.

"I have some findings on Sheaper, which I've conducted over the years," began Edi, who stepped forward. Everyone, apart from Garrus, Sania and Hiul looked at her like her old crew - hopeful and expecting. Yet she stood there slouched in her hoodie and messy hair, bags under her eyes.

Edi without action prompted the lights to dim and a screen on the opposite wall to Shepard flickered on.

"Wait, you might have to fill me in a bit," cut in Shepard, stepping closer to the table. "On Sheaper, I mean. A recap."

"As far as we know," began Liara, earnest as ever, "your clone was the one responsible for the attack that led to your desertion on the dwarf planet Aegeus. Several months after, all of us still thinking the clone were still you, the Reaper invasion had begun. Earth was the first to be attacked…." Liara paused, then faltered. Shepard stiffened slightly. What had she presumed before?

"Somehow, Sheaper found out about the Catalyst, the Reaper's master AI, who had confronted her on the Citadel. It believed she was the real Shepard. It gave her a choice, destroy all synthetic life, merge organic and synthetic life or control the Reapers."

"How do you know all this? How is it possible?" asked Shepard. Liara folded her arms, raising her eyebrows.

"You forget I was once an information broker, Shep," she said with a small smile. Shepard nearly smiled herself.

"Sania has also provided us with a wealth of information," Liara continued. Sania stepped forward.

"I was an agent working for Cerberus, based on Mars before the Reaper invasion. We uncovered a prothean weapon, the Crucible-" Sania began.

"The Crucible?" cut in Hiul.

"Yes Hool, prothean blueprints for a huge weapon were found on Mars. Were you one of the engineers working on it? Could you possibly tell us anything about-" began Liara.

"No I wasn't. I was primarily a pilot who specialised in aerodynamics," Hiul replied without much emotion in his voice. Liara promptly looked away from him. Shepard wondered if she was reminded of the previous prothean teammate. Were they much alike? Arrogant and hostile?

"Wanna pilot the Normandy some time? You can be my first mate," said Joker, taking a sip from what looked like weak coffee.

"I would be bored within an hour," said Hiul. If this was an attempt at humour, it didn't work very well. Joker seemed to deflect it like water off a duck's back.

"Ah, right. Yeah, the whole 'the controls are primitive' thing-"

"What is this with the word primitive?" snapped Hiul.

"Well you protheans think you're pretty superior with this entire ancient guru of wisdom bulls-"

"Hey, enough!" Shepard raised her voice enough to silence them. Joker immediately silenced, probably reminded of the Commander from the old days who could joke about one thing to nearly tearing their heads off the next. Even if she kept telling everyone she was no longer their 'official' Commander, she couldn't help but act like it. It made her mentally kick herself for being so contradicting, and predictable.

"As I was saying before," began Sania, stepping forward. "We believed the Catalyst, as we later found out, was a key component to the Crucible weapon. What the clone found out instead, was in fact it was the 'Intelligence' the master AI of the reapers. While the reapers attacked half the galaxy, the clone had come across this information on the Citadel. It gave her several options, two of which we know to be true: the clone's consciousness was assimilated into that of the catalyst, and that the process of merging organics and synthetics had begun. We know that the clone had the weapon hastily built with limited expertise and without the help of the Alliance. Therefore it only half worked as well – hence the Terminus Systems is still unmerged."

"What happened to Earth and the Alliance?" asked Shepard. Sania fixed her with a steady gaze, before looking over at the rest of the crew, ready to open her mouth.

"I don't think this is the best time, Sania," said Liara.

"What isn't?" Shepard asked, quickly becoming irritated. She felt Garrus's gaze hot on her face and neck.

"You're a decorated military commander, Shepard. Surely you can handle such news?" said Sania.

"Not from you. And that's rather insensitive, considering the circumstances," snapped Liara. Sania fixed her an angry glare, and then turned away back towards Garrus who remained still. His mandibles were taut on his scarred face.

"Kate…Earth was the first to be attacked by the reapers. It suffered a lot of damage. Billions of lives were lost…" Liara had walked closer to Shepard, attempting to reach out to her, with a steady hand. "The Alliance was the first to go. It was completely dissolved, with only few numbers left back on Earth."

"Mutated enemies, such as husks among many others too hideous to mention, made short work of what was left," said Sania. "Contact hasn't been made with Earth for years."

"The clone actually transported the Citadel to the Sol System, where it was close to Earth…That's where we think her cronies are stationed," Joker said.

"When the clone became the master AI, she used whoever was left on Earth as a sort of experiment…many humans were either slain or merged with synthetics, controlled by Sheaper," continued Edi. Shepard stared at them all in disbelief, her head turning from one face to another.

"From what I have seen, Earth is now a vast wasteland…whoever survived have banded together in small groups but kill on sight, friendly or not," filled in Sania.

Shepard abruptly turned away; with her shoulders slumped, her body looked as if it no longer could hold her up. Her knees buckled as the scenery in front of her fizzled with her sudden grief. She walked away from the people behind her, staring into an empty void, her breaths short and sharp. Despair washed over her as she sank against the wall, her feet no longer able to carry her. She then fell to her knees, burying her head in her arms, as a cry of anguish ricocheted throughout the deck.

* * *

Liara sat in Shepard's cabin, watching the woman sleep. She couldn't see the commander's face, for it was turned away, but her hair, ebony-coloured, was spread-eagled out on the white pillow. Liara thought it almost looked child-like: the small body, usually so much taller, was curled into a tight ball under the sheets. After Shepard had been told what'd happened to Earth, she went to her cabin and didn't appear for over ten hours. Liara had gone to check, at first wary of how the commander would react. Edi thankfully opened the doors for her, as there was no answer. Liara was drawn out of her thoughts, away from her tablet by a tap on the outer door. Garrus was stood outside.

"Garrus…" said Liara, completely surprised.

"How…" He looked a bit awkward with himself. "How is she?"

"I don't really know, she's been sleeping it off," Liara replied. "It's unlike her."

"I didn't think sleeping was a way of coping for a human," he said.

"I think they deal with it in many different ways." There was an unusual silence between them. It had been a long time since Liara had last seen the turian, whom she'd been a close friend to. It seemed like he had changed far too much. He had been unusually reserved since he'd boarded the _Normandy_, tending to stay closer to Sania.

"Go in," she tried, motioning him in before he could protest. "I think perhaps you're the only one that can draw her out." He fixed her with a momentary glare, but then the doors shot open.

"Oh, sorry Kate, did we wake you?" Shepard ignored Liara, looking at Garrus calmly.

The turian nearly scowled, why did Liara _insist_ on calling her by that name? He stared back at Shepard, trying to ignore the fact she was clothed only in clothing that showed off her shoulders and half her long legs. Why did she choose, as a human, to wear such skimpy clothing on a military vessel? Her human hair was longer than he'd known it to be previously, reaching her shoulders. Why did she look good with it long, despite her evident undernourishment? Wait. He had to pull himself together, he wasn't attracted to humans. He convinced himself of that long ago; their curiously flat faces and bulging eyes, their potent odours, too many fingers (and toes! That one really did make his skin crawl), curiously bare skin apart from the strange thing named hair…. No other species he'd come across had hair like humans. And why was it only in certain places? He'd think it was a bother, having that hair to tend to, especially as humans did. Constantly cutting and trimming and shaving. Somehow on Shepard he thought the contrast of her alabaster skin with her black hair attractive. Her skin was ridiculously smooth and her hips were-

"No, it's okay," Shepard said suddenly to Liara.

"I'd better go," he said quickly, turning before he could embarrass himself further.

What the spirits was _wrong_ with him? He tried to banish all memories of her cabin from his mind as he took the elevator. But they flooded back like a torrential flash flood. The image of her naked didn't want to fade from his mind. He'd been so tongue-tied at first, and probably still was. He knew why though. He'd always had a bit of a crush on her, but he'd suppressed it quickly, as she was a human and a military commander. There was still animosity between humans and turians, although they'd recently improved for the better. Relationships between the two species were still looked upon unfavourably, mostly by the decorated elite of his race. He knew he'd have to tread lightly, and besides she was at the height of her career. So it was forgotten and they'd become firm friends. But his mind ran away with itself as he walked back to the gun battery. How her skin felt, how she smelt, as he peeled her clothes off, piece by piece.

He wasn't sure what he expected, but he certainly didn't expect her to be confident like she had been. She later seductively peeled off her undergarments, (for his embarrassment and lack of knowledge) while keeping her large eyes firmly fixated on him. Despite him being a turian, somehow she'd had the foreknowledge to touch him in all the right places. If she hadn't made the move, he wasn't sure if he would've. He wasn't going to lie and say the first time hadn't been completely hassle free: working out each others anatomy was at the best of times amusing. She'd ended up with several deep cuts on her backside and chafed skin on the inside of her thighs. He had tried to be careful with her, but it had proven to be difficult by the time he'd forgotten his nervousness and lust clouded his senses. She told him Mordin Solus had warned her about potential chafing, to which he felt horrified. Mordin? By the time he stepped back out on the crew deck, he felt aroused by his own memories of her and retreated to the gun battery, hoping no one would disturb him.

* * *

Garrus was still going to carry out his bargain with the batarian group: the obtaining of a special weapon. The batarian mercs had been developing incredibly high-tech weaponry that in the eyes of Sheaper was illegal. However, she didn't have as much stretch in the Terminus Systems. It still had various risks involved. A couple of days later Shepard managed to emerge from the cave that was her cabin. According to Liara, she looked much better. Perhaps it was the sleep that she needed to catch up on, but it wasn't without its disturbances. Vivid dreams had plagued her sleep for a while, as she drifted in and out of consciousness. They were all set round the table in the briefing room, apart from the usual absence of Hiul and Joker. Sania had explained Garrus's bargain. Shepard, who'd been sitting backwards in her chair with her arms crossed suddenly snorted.

"Like that's gonna have no strings attached," she scoffed. Sania fixed her with an irritated glance.

"Shepard, this will help in our mission. Surely your hatred of batarians can be overcome for once?"

"You barely know me," replied Shepard without batting an eyelash. Sania smirked at her.

"We all know about you, Shepard," she said. "The whole galaxy came to know about you. And from my previous background in Cerberus, I know more than you'd like to think." Cerberus? Shepard reminded herself to file this one away for later. She did wonder how she'd just come to know about this. What was Garrus thinking?

"Are you still loyal to them?" Shepard asked.

"No, I'm not." Sania was looking at her without blinking.

"I'm supposed to believe that?" said Shepard. Sania glanced at Garrus briefly and then smiled at Shepard.

"We'll see."

Shepard nostrils flared as she stared at the woman. Enraged, she suddenly hauled herself across the briefing table in less than five seconds. Throwing herself on top of Sania, she drove the lithe woman into the floor. Sudden blue encased Sania's form, and Shepard before having the time to realise, was thrown into the opposite wall. Her head slammed hard against the cool metal before she was flung to the floor. Sania's face was now red as she breathed deeply.

"I have a hard time believing you're not an agent of the clone," she spat at Shepard, who tried to regain her breath on the floor.

"Oh really? Tell me why I shouldn't kick you, a previous agent of Cerberus, off my ship right now?" Shepard countered, after having stood up. Somehow fire in her had propelled her energy to fight again.

"I've been having a hard time of it too," Garrus suddenly spoke, taking a step closer to Shepard, scrutinising her face. Did he expect to see something that confirmed her to be an imposter?

"Still have reach, Garrus?" she said with spite in her voice, raising her eyebrows at him. His features tightened slightly.

"It's been a long time. Things have changed," said Garrus. "We're under no obligation to help you."

"Oh, what then? So you can take up being pompous professionally?" she countered.

She was provoking him on purpose, knowing that his short fuse probably hadn't changed. He suddenly grabbed her wrist, pulling her towards him, and twisted it painfully. She felt his talons dig into her skin, as he towered over her, his face close to hers. His breath was hot on her forehead. Turians could be quite menacing when they wanted to. She had forgotten how rough his skin could feel; something made the hairs on the back of her neck stand up.

"Enough!" shouted Liara. Garrus immediately let go of her, surprised Liara could raise her voice like that.

"Your Commander isn't what she used to be," said Sania. "Somewhat mentally unstable."

"I couldn't care for your opinion," snapped Liara, turning to Garrus. "Garrus, come back to us. Please. I don't even know who you are anymore." Sorrow graced her features.

"Things have changed, Liara. I don't know what your motivations are," he said, pointedly shooting a look towards Shepard. "But it's not going to be like the good old days."

"I do wonder whether you've been indoctrinated," suddenly spoke Edi, who had been silent this entire conversation.

"You've gotta be _kidding_ me," snapped Garrus, turning his back on them for a moment.

"It is entirely possible, especially if you have been near one of the merged zones lately."

"Indoctrination? Like Saren?" asked Shepard, perturbed in all of a sudden. Edi straightened up out of her chair.

"The Reapers and their technology have an indoctrinating effect on organic life," Edi reminded her. "A signal or energy field surrounds the Reaper or technology which subtly influences the organic's mind. The Reapers are spread around the galaxy, but mostly in the Earth-Alliance and Council spaces partly in the Traverse. Most of them are concentrated in 'merged' sites where the clone had merged synthetics and organics together. Through the Reapers, she indoctrinates them and controls them." Shepard couldn't believe her ears. This was horrific.

"I'll let you know that I've kept well away from that part of the galaxy for the better part of these last fifteen years," said Garrus. "I've stayed in the Terminus Systems."

"But that's not without the risks," interrupted Liara. "You fully know that Sheaper has indoctrinated agents spread through this system. She's stationed several Reaper bases in one corner of this system. The Shrike Abyssal and the Hourglass Nebula."

"I don't care what you're insinuating. I don't have to listen to you or the likes of her again!" Garrus said, and stormed from the room. Sania followed suit. Liara suddenly slumped down in her chair.

* * *

Perhaps Sania had stern words with Garrus, thought Shepard as they journeyed to a small moon that belonged to the planet Urdak. They still stayed within the same system, Sahrabarik, where the planet Urdak was not far from where Omega-2 was stationed (exactly, as Shepard thought, where the first Omega was). She had heard before that various Omega crime syndicates had made residence on the various moons of their planet. As they took an old rover down, one similar to that of the Mako, the terrain was rocky, with mountain-like regions behind the large stretch of modern glass buildings before them. Nothing grew. The sky was dark with little light coming from the nearest star. Shepard hadn't any idea why rich batarian crime lords would like it here. Perhaps it was the peace and quiet. Not only that, they were the only population that littered the tiny moon. Garrus parked the rover many metres away. Liara and the rest had remained on the ship. Garrus this time completely ignored her, and more than anything this began to hurt her. She preferred it when he got angry with her. Despite the talon marks she'd received on her arm, she'd briefly relished feeling him on her.

"What if it doesn't go according to plan?" said Shepard as they jumped out the vehicle. "We'll need a quick getaway. Running fifty metres to the rover doesn't sound like a good idea to me."

"It _will_ go according to plan," replied Sania. "If you haven't noticed, there are large turrets on either side of the building. Even if they are aware they are coming they'll still shoot anything down."

Shepard made no comment as she followed behind them, muttering angrily in her head. Several times she'd slipped on the rocky terrain, hoping the two in front hadn't heard her. She'd begun to regret the fact that she asserted several times she was no longer the commander. Which she technically wasn't, but at times she couldn't help being the leader. Or perhaps it was Sania, and that Sania's closeness to Garrus had sparked a childish jealousy in her, not helped by her current heartache. Could she help it? She'd never felt this way before about anyone. She saw the way Sania looked at him, and he her, although his was more genuine: hers originated from an over-inflated ego.

"Are you sure it's a good idea that Shepard goes with us?" Garrus muttered to Sania as they continued walking. "They might recognise her and blast her head off." Sania softly chuckled.

"It's been a while Garrus, and not everyone in the galaxy knew Shepard or what she looked like originally. Besides, she's our backup."

Shepard's irritation was constant. She dressed in the same armour as previous, with the hood over her helmet. After entering through the airlock and security clearance, they entered a brightly lit nightclub with two, well-filled bars. It had the appearance of one of the casinos back on the Citadel: bright lights, smooth streamlined walls, and a modern and expensive feel to it. Many batarians were there, some gambling on the Quasar machines. Perhaps this was a refuge for them – against the Reapers they didn't stand a chance, for they had no official allies. Some were at the bars with asari or human women on their hips. There were several turians and human men as well. Red carpet was beneath them and large chandeliers above them. Why the hell was this going on while the galaxy is in the state it is? Shepard thought. It was worse than she'd seen it. Human women and asari scantily clad danced in lit corners or hung off the hips of turians or batarians. It was unnerving, and she'd felt like she had stepped into a time gone by, only with aliens. Many of the batarians and turians stared at them. They walked towards the back of the room, towards double doors. Shepard locked eyes with a load of batarians that were sat down beside the doors, looking as if they were ready to attack them.

"What're you lookin' at?" One challenged her. She could do with a fight. She grabbed the front of his tunic and hauled him up into her face.

"Someone's day I'm about to ruin…" she said, her voice low with menace. Sania quickly intervened, pulling Shepard roughly back from the batarian. Shepard eventually let go of his tunic.

"We're looking for Vatil-Khal," she said to a tall, well-dressed batarian standing beside the door. They stared Shepard down, but she ignored them.

"As long as you leave her out here. You Sania?" the taller batarian snarled.

"Yes, is he expecting us?"

"Go in," said the other batarian, and activated the doors to open for them.

Shepard gave Garrus one last look before they disappeared inside the door. Shepard decided to walk over to a relatively quiet spot beside the glowing bar. The air in the room felt stifling, and the bartender fixed her with a steady glare as she walked over. She remained unfazed, catching a glimpse of her face in the shiny wall opposite. She looked away quickly. Her face looked fuller than it had been, and her eyes darker now that she'd began lining then with kohl again. Shepard felt like she was being watched, even though no one around her paid any attention. Cautiously, she attempted to move around hoping detract any notice. It wasn't long before she realised she wouldn't be able to shake it off until she left. Casually, she made her way back through the ground and out into the large foyer, which formed as a long corridor. It wasn't until she came to the end of the foyer that a fairly large man was behind her holding a shotgun, accompanied by a batarian. She turned, read to face them. She was met with a pistol. The hall they were in was deadly quiet.

"Are you looking for a fight?" she said.

"You were standing idle for too long, human," said the batarian who held the weapon. "Especially in that getup."

"You think my outfit was suspicious? Just because the rest of the women aren't wearing anything?" she retorted. Both of them looked at each other and chuckled. The man went to hit her in the stomach, but she was ready for him, taking his arm and forcing him to the floor with all her body weight. She then slammed his head into the floor again for good measure, before intercepting the batarian's attack. Between them they struggled for several minutes, but to her surprise they eventually got her on the floor. Those bastards on Aegeus had physically weakened her, more than she'd thought. The man had blood over his face. He grabbed his shotgun that was left lying on the floor and pushed into her abdomen. The batarian pulled her pistol from its holster.

"You were with another human and turian," the batarian said. "They went into the back room. The name of the seller and the weapon. Now." The human took great pleasure in pressing the barrel of the shotgun into her stomach.

"No idea," she replied. She felt like sighing: why did Garrus allow himself to deal with dodgy dealers? "Why are you interested?"

"You're not in a position to be asking questions," snapped the man.

"I don't know, and even if I did, I wouldn't garble it like an idiot just because you're pointing a gun in my stomach," she snapped. The batarian struck her hard round the face. Her jaw rattled. He kneeled in front of her, spitting.

"Stop wasting my time, filth. The name of the seller, and the name of the weapon. Now."

She headbutted him as an answer, and he reeled back in agony. Shepard then grabbed the barrel of the shotgun, pushing it upwards as the man let it off in her hands. It blew a hole into the ceiling above them, littering plaster and concrete around them. Ignoring the searing heat from the shotgun's barrel, she forced the butt of the gun into the man's face repeatedly. From the corner of her eye she could see the batarian get back up. The man tried to resist her, as she shoved him into the batarian. Running back to grab her pistol, she felt a presence behind her. The batarian slammed her face-front into the wall. He managed to eject the thermal clip as they struggled for a moment, shooting the empty barrel beside her face. The shot rang in her ears. He then pushed her back against the wall, with her arms crossed over her chest. Bringing a sharp knee up to his groin area, Shepard flung the batarian down in front of her with force. The pistol was flung out of reach. However the other man had managed to grab hold of the shotgun and aimed it at her.

"One last chance, Shepard," he said, smirking at her. He reloaded the shotgun.

"How do you know who I am?" she said. She noticed the batarian's pistol lay near her feet.

"Word gets around," said the man. "A lot of people want you dead." He saw her looking at the pistol.

"The name, and I'll let you go if you don't touch that gun."

With lightning speed, she unsheathed a knife from the side of her leg armour and flung it into his throat. He dropped the gun immediately, which set it off with a loud bang. Moving out the way quickly, she moved towards him and pressed her knee into his chest. Pumping the handgrip, she aimed at the batarian who'd got back up, and shot right through his abdomen. His bloody insides flew out behind him on the other side, straight onto the wall. The man below her was choking and spluttering, and his blood spread quickly onto the floor as a puddle. She heard the batarian fall to the floor silently behind.

"Who do you work for?" she interrogated him. He didn't answer, and she pulled the knife out of his throat. He screamed in agony. Mercilessly wiping the knife on his jacket, she took the shotgun and left them on the floor.


	16. Close to Breakdown

**A/N: Two chapters, just cos y'all been so patient :3 **

* * *

"Shepard, your nose is bloody," Liara picked up immediately when they were back on the _Normandy_. Shepard, pulling her helmet off as she'd walked from the airlock, strode past Liara ignoring her. Liara, perturbed, only saw Garrus trail in after her, taking his helmet off.

"Where's Sania? What about the deal and the weapon?" said Liara, studying the turian's face.

"Deal gone bad," he replied, weary. He had his sniper rifle in his hands. "Sania's fine. But she'd run into an old boss. Had to go and sort things out."

"Sounds _so_ convincing," called Joker from the cockpit.

"Skirmish between Shepard and two thugs. She only told me they were asking about the seller's name. The one who was going to sell us the weapon."

"What happened?"

"She brutally killed both the thugs…" he said, trailing off. Liara frowned, deep in thought.

"When is Sania coming back? Did she say?" asked Liara, looking back up at Garrus, who'd already started to make his way to the elevator.

"I don't know, Liara…Even if this clone Shepard story is true, that's not the same human I knew fifteen years ago. She gouged the human thug's throat with a knife and blasted a batarian to unrecognisability. The rest of the facility was alerted to the shootings, and we had to run. She's totally pitiless." He gave Liara one last look before disappearing from the room. Liara felt a brief sensation of despair. In part, Garrus was right. It was unlike Commander Shepard to kill in cold blood, but then again she'd been threatened. Liara returned to the cockpit, which seemed to be her residual spot these days. For some reason staying in the depths of the ship knowing no one else was on that deck made her feel nervous. Edi looked over towards her as she entered.

"I'm worried about Shepard," said Liara. "She's not…."

"Not right in the head?" finished Joker.

"Joker, please try not to be insensitive at this time," she admonished him. "I don't know whether it was the torture she went through on that dwarf planet or-"

"Shepard's been through way more than any of us," interrupted Joker. "She thought we were all dead not so long ago. From what she told us, they psychologically tortured her on Aegeus. Then she had to put up with Hool, the prothean that's even a bigger dick than Javik was."

Meanwhile, the commander was in the shower, running the day's grime off.

_What are we doing here? Why aren't we doing something?_ The truth was, she was at her wit's end. She wanted to do something with her pent-up anger, and she wanted to do it immediately. Killing petty thugs wasn't enough. She needed to find Sheaper and destroy her. But how was it possible to defeat Sheaper and her Reaper army when there was no Alliance? There was no council? No Earth? The Terminus Systems were now a place of crime, worse than before, where resources were limited and violence was rife. She didn't feel like herself. As she walked towards her bed, towelling her hair off, she wished Anderson was still here. He'd give her the courage of her convictions, remind her who she really was. Not some shell of a solider, callous and violent, forever scarred by her experiences.

Among other vivid nightmares, she also dreamt of Garrus. _I just want things to go right for once, _he'd said. She often wondered whether he'd made a rash decision based on the fact that she'd actually flirted with him. Why did it hurt so much? Was it because he deemed her to be his only close friend in the galaxy? Well. She'd _fucked_ it up by sleeping with him, something she'd never even dreamed of considering. Every waking moment in his presence was unbearable, especially if he made some disparaging, passive-aggressive comment. An uncomfortable feeling washed over her. Was she beginning to fall in love with him? No, that was a utterly ridiculous thought.

* * *

The next day, Shepard found Hiul and Garrus in the cockpit. Joker looked to be mapping coordinates. She had slipped on her N7 hoodie without bothering to wash her hair, and walked tired-eyed into the cockpit.

"I don't understand why this human Sania has disappeared so quickly without due cause," Hiul was saying.

"I don't have to explain it to you, prothean," said Garrus. Without looking at either of them, Shepard walked past them towards Joker's screen. At the sight of her they became silent.

"Hey Commander, minding telling those two aliens behind us to shut up?" said Joker.

"What course are you plotting?" she demanded, forgetting that for the past few days she'd been telling everyone she wasn't the commander. Perhaps she couldn't help it.

"Looks like you did it without even saying anything," muttered Joker.

"Back to Omega?" she asked him. "If we're going to stop the Reapers, Omega is not my first port of call, Joker." Joker seemed to hesitate; thankfully Edi over the intercom had come to his rescue.

"We received a message that was in binary code. I decrypted it."

"And? Can it be trusted?" Shepard said.

"A few years ago both Joker and I had met up some old crewmates. Unfortunately we had been separated, of which I won't presently go into. We decided to communicate via binary code, so we could avoid detection."

"Wouldn't that message just get hacked by another computer?" said Shepard, frowning. She didn't believe this rather all-too-easy way of doing things.

"Binary code is the simplest way of communicating without being detected. The messages are communicated via simple words and phrases. To most hackers and other programs it passes off as spam, an advertisement or an error message."

"Riiiiight," said Shepard, folding her arms.

"Err, Edi, she's doing the 'fold the arms thing' again," warned Joker.

"The message looks like this," Edi said, tapping the screen in front of her. Shepard narrowed her eyes to look at the orange screen.

_Need to wrangle, roast or extinguish an enemy? Xenjack Inc: Rent a Krogan. Big guns and a ton of aggression, for all your assassination needs. Peak Period Discount for a Limited Time Only! _

"What the hell…" was all Shepard could say. Joker turned round to laugh at her.

"It's friggin' _hilarious_!"

"Where though?" said Shepard, trying to discern each and every word. Joker pointed out another false advertisement underneath on the screen.

"Sponsored by Omega watches? They're _still_ going?" Shepard snorted. They'd been around since the dawn of time.

"Hm, kinda. They sell tiny omni-tool things that strap on your wrist. They're a bit crap to be honest-"

"I'm at a loss," said Shepard immediately. She wasn't one for faffing around decrypting messages.

"Oh yeah, forgot you were a 'get it done and shut-up' kind of gal," said Joker. She nearly snapped at him for being so irreverent, then remembered immediately. _Not a Commander, technically._

"Who?" demanded Shepard.

"It's Wrex. And Jack." Suddenly Garrus had came up beside her, studying the message on the orange screen.

"That's a possible fake," he spoke, his deep voice rumbling beside Shepard. She tried not to flinch, as he stood so close next to her. "I've worked a lot with these sorts of codes-"

"Oh hey Garrus! You managed to work that pole back up your ass yet? Oh wait – it's already there," said Joker. Garrus, who would've normally responded to this with dry wit, said nothing and turned from her. He still wore his visor, she noted. _I hope he didn't read my pulse_. Her chest felt like it began to ache with her constant hard heartbeats, as she frowned at the message.

"Please explain how it's Wrex and Jack. No offence to them, but they weren't exactly the type I'd say to create a code like this-" Garrus interrupted her by leaning across her and pointing at Joker's screen. His taloned finger stabbed the various letters on the transparent orange screen.

"Krogan is a big giveaway. Wrangle, roast, extinguish followed by 'Xenjac?' I'd spell that out as W-r-e-x, then 'J-a-c.'"

"Wrex and Jack?" said Shepard, astonished that Garrus could read the English alphabet.

"Since when did you learn to read English?" said Joker, turning round to look at Garrus. "Have you been speaking English the _entire_ time since you boarded?" Garrus, realising he'd been standing too close to Shepard took a step back, addressing Joker instead of her.

"Since omni-tools were no longer mass-produced or constantly being updated due to the extranet's demise, English became the preferred standard language for trade." Shepard frowned.

"Why the human language? Not turian or asari?" Garrus didn't look at her as he answered.

"Turian is the other language, but the English is preferred."

"Sania taught you English then?" said Shepard testily. She dreaded to think of the both of them, holed up somewhere, with her breathing seductively down his neck while she taught him the A-B-C's. Garrus didn't honour her with a reply.

"Back to Omega, then," she said to Joker, and abruptly turned away.

"Aye, aye," replied the helmsman. Wrex and Jack – Shepard wasn't sure whether she wanted to meet them. They were the more angrily inclined sort. Despite everything, hope resided. More of their crew might be out there, scattered about. The more support, the more they had to take down the clone and the Reapers.

* * *

As they travelled back towards Omega, ETA was several hours away. For some reason Shepard couldn't bear to be wandering around the Normandy with so many crewmembers missing. Most of the meals that Joker, a surprisingly good cook, had made up she took to her cabin instead. There were still many questions about the galaxy that were unanswered: how were the Krogan faring? Did Liara still have access to the shadow broker's resources? What happened exactly to the extranet? There was no access to it on the terminal in her cabin. Her was head was constantly brimming with questions. It felt like some nightmare. Most thoughts of Earth she had to block from her mind. Perhaps it was not the best idea to be spending time in her cabin alone, letting herself ruminate to the point of anxiety.

Garrus mainly kept to the battery, Sania probably with him, but he did seem to join them at mealtimes and occasionally wander the ship. So she avoided him. He well and truly despised her. She couldn't make him understand the truth – after all, for her it had just been two months. He had fifteen years on her. As she sat there at her desk, eating Joker's ramen, she suddenly remembered her mother who used to hum some version of the Bonnie Raitt classic, shortly after her parents had their usual argument. After eating, she returned to her bed to sleep, waiting until the next possible moment arrived. It seemed like her only way to escape the nightmare she was currently in.

But sleep didn't grant her any peace at all – in fact it was much worse. Recurring nightmares about the trauma she'd learnt to deal with in life returned to disturb her. Most of them included the recent – her torture on Aegeus, followed by the shock upon learning fifteen years had passed, and the results of it. When she woke, disturbed, sweaty and nauseous, the reality began to consume her once more. There was, unfortunately, no escape from it. She ignored the knocks on her door, the messages sent to the small terminal in her room and the sound of Edi's voice asking if she was alright.

Shepard attempted to cool off in the shower, hoping to wash away the shock and sweat of the nightmare but all it did was make her feel worse. What the fuck was the matter with her? She'd learnt to deal with this. Mindoir was something you could never recover from, but she'd dealt with it better than most people. Everything else – including nearly dying, the assault on the collector base….It only strengthened her. Scars told her the story of how she was still alive, still fighting the powers that be. But now….There was only pain - the repetition of recent events in her mind – and nothing else. A deep black void of terror.

* * *

"She's not answering the door, messages and even Edi," Liara was saying to Joker in the cockpit.

"What can we do? She's locked the door," replied Joker. "ETA for Omega is now fifteen minutes by the way."

"What about the half a dozen Oculus trailing us? Did you manage to escape them?" Joker turned round to face Liara, with his eyebrows raised.

"Liara, you know me better than that…Come on, an _Oculus_? I'm insulted you don't think my skills are-" Liara sighed loudly. She was attempted to fix old, split wires that were currently dangling from the cockpit's jumbled ceiling.

"The clone updated them years ago to track remains of the Alliance. Including Shepard's closest friends. That would be us."

"I know, I know, but you also remember that time we acquired better kinetic shields and a brand new stealth system? Those turians weren't kidding when they told us they had some good tech." Liara fiddled with the wires in frustration. Omni tools, having never been updated in fifteen years were now useless to new technology. She had to do it the hard way; use her fingers and a spanner. She saw the white glow of Omega-2 approach them slowly, against the endless void of stars.

"Joker, I'm being serious now. I'm really worried about her. We've all time to adjust. We've had fifteen years. There's been so little hope in this galaxy since the clone's domination. I thought the Crucible sounded like a weapon that could be used to destroy the Reapers completely," she said.

"Liara, I know. I've never seen Shepard like this before. Even in the worst of situations we had on this ship she'd pull through and tell everyone she'd kick someone's ass or everything was all right. Shepard used to save everything before."

"I think we need to get her to a doctor," mumbled Liara. She'd pricked her finger on a particularly sharp wire. She pushed her goggles back up onto her forehead.

"A doctor? What for? So they can open her mouth and tell her to go 'Aaaahhhh'?"

"A doctor that can help her for her mental health," said Liara.

"I don't know about you, but mental health services for humans, even in this day and age, is still shit."

Liara gave up with the wires, brushing her dirty hands on her black worker's tunic. Sometimes Joker was not the best person to talk to. She'd been with them for over five years now and Lord knows he could drive her up the wall. She walked back to Shepard's cabin for the last time, hoping somehow the Commander would open the door. She felt a tiny fear, one she'd never felt before, reside in her heart. Shepard needed help.

* * *

Liara managed to bump into Garrus on her way towards Shepard's cabin, who'd just exited from the elevator. His mandibles tautened as he caught her eye. She looked at him enquiringly, brushing the dirt off her tunic again. Never did she think, the historian and scientist, she'd go all techy and dig around in the engines getting dirty. Garrus was looking at her in that usual way; he wanted to say something, but was unable to.

"There something you want to say, Garrus?" she asked him. He straightened up suddenly, looking her square in the way, his nervousness dissolved.

"No…Other than Sania is back on Omega. I plan to rendezvous with her…" he said.

"Right…" said Liara. "Is that what you want, Garrus?" He faltered, for a second or two.

"Yes, it is. You know it can't be like it was. The galaxy is not like it was," he said. "I'm much better off-"

"Doing what, exactly?" Liara snapped. "Travelling around, hoping you'll relive those days on Omega when you were killing mercs? Hoping that out of that will come some glorified sense of achievement? That whatever loss you felt in life is filled in with trying to play judge, jury and executioner?" The asari had her fists clutched together, almost wanting to lift and throw him to the other side of the room in anger. It felt like it was only her that understood the truth about Shepard. Garrus's irritation peaked slightly, being of the same as Shepard's. Easily provoked.

"You don't know me anymore, T'Soni, nor does anyone else around here. I'm fine with the way things are – I know what you're cooking up in that asari head of yours. Some plan to use Shepard to 'save' the galaxy."

"You're lying to yourself, Garrus!" shouted Liara. "What is _wrong_ with you?" He stepped forward, pointing a single bony digit in front of her face accusingly.

"Nothing is wrong with me, Liara. You can't accept that I've moved on, like everyone else around here. You're chasing an endless dream with Joker and Edi."

"Edi is definitely not chasing a dream," bit back Liara.

"It's been fifteen years, and I hear from you? With the 'real' Shepard? When were you planning that?" he said. Fifteen years, thought Liara. Far too long. She'd lost friends on the way. _Feron_. Someone whom she'd grown to love, despite what they'd been through together.

"You still don't believe she's the real Shepard? Didn't you listen at all?" she said to him, aghast. He was quiet for a moment, looking at the ground.

"I don't know," he said. "If she was an agent, she would've killed or betrayed us by now. I'm not that gullible or stupid, Liara. But time has moved on." He brushed past her before she had time to retort. Liara didn't turn back round to say anything and took the elevator up to Shepard's cabin. The door, as usual, was firmly shut and stayed that way when she knocked again.

"Edi, would you be able to open this door? I'm through with being polite," Liara said.

"Of course, Liara. You might've asked me that in the first place." The door turned green and shot open.

"Like I said, I was being polite. She's still our Commander."

"I know," replied Edi. The cabin was stuffy – something that hadn't been aired by their conditioner for a while. Dirty clothes were strewn about on the floor and various plates hadn't been cleaned away. Liara caught a bowl of uneaten food that smelt…._Goddess_, she nearly gagged. The sheets of the bed were all twisted up, but there was no body inside them.

"Shepard?" began Liara. She heard running water from the bathroom. Using her age-old omni-tool, Liara used it to burst open the bathroom door. Shepard was curled up on the floor fully clothed. The shower, still running, had soaked her completely. Her eyes were closed. Liara turned off the water and grabbed a dry towel, encasing her tightly in it.

"Shepard?" Liara tried again, pressing her fingers into the woman's neck. A slow pulse. "Kate?" It was a several minutes before Shepard's eyes flickered open.

"Hm…What? Liara, how'd you get in?"

"Kate I'm worried about you," Liara replied.

"Go away, Liara," snapped Shepard, regaining some semblance of strength. Liara could smell alcohol on the woman's breath and recoiled slightly. _Where'd_ _she_ _get_ _the_ _alcohol?_ Liara knew that Shepard was slightly averse to her mothering at times. But she couldn't help it; it was part of her stubborn, caring nature.

"Kate please-"

"And stop calling me by that name," snapped Shepard, pulling her arm forcefully away from Liara's hands.

"I thought we agreed it was-"

"Yeah well, no one has called me Kate since I was sixteen," she said again. Liara stared at her, offended. There was silence, nothing but the steady drip of the showerhead was heard.

"Then why…" was all Liara could say. "Why would you tell me that? You agreed it wasn't the best idea to call you Shepard in public." Shepard's face was turned away from Liara, facing the silvery wall. Her hair was soaking wet and clung to her neck. Liara could see the shape of her rather too-small ears and the curve of her skull.

"My mind was focused on other things," Shepard slurred. Liara paused, desperately trying to think of something to say.

"The Commander I know wouldn't give up like this," she said, her voice low. Shepard turned her face back to look at Liara.

"Get the fuck out, Liara," she said, in a threatening tone that made Liara's skin prickle. She'd heard that incensed voice before – a remnant of the person that was still there.

"Shepard don't do this to yourself," pleaded Liara.

"GET OUT!" yelled Shepard. Liara stood up quickly. She turned to look at the woman one last time. Shepard had turned away from her, her head leaning against the wall again. Tears pricked the back of Liara's eyes. She furiously blinked them away, and left the lonely cabin.


End file.
